The Last Night of the World
by chocolatelova
Summary: Five years after the war, Hitomi and Van are unexpectedly reunited. They are thrown into a vortex of strange events, and Hitomi must choose between two worlds. But the choice is not as simple as it seems.
1. Prologue

Author's edit: When I went back and reread the prologue, I decided it needed a major face lift, so I went and revamped it. I like it much better now. And I hope you do too :)

Setting: The royal castle at Palas, Asturia, on the night of the allied nations' victory over the Zaibach empire.

-

**The Last Night of the World **

**Prologue**

-

_So stay with me  
and hold me tight  
and dance  
like it's the last night of the world_

_- "The Last Night of the World" from Miss Saigon_

-

Kanzaki Hitomi fell onto her bed with a bone-weary _flump._ After these harrowing months of blood and sweat, sorrow and tragedy, it was finally over—the greatest war that Gaea had ever seen. Now that the war was over, her fortune-telling days were over, too. The last thought filled her with relief. No more would she see the blood-drenched visions, hear the screams of dying soldiers, or witness the impending deaths of everyone around her. Gaea was safe from Dornkirk now, and from her.

_Van is safe as well_, she thought. Her hand came to rest on the rose-colored stone in the pendant she wore around her neck. So many of her visions had been about the dark-haired boy king of Fanelia. Was it because he was the dragon and she was the girl from the Mystic Moon, as envisioned by the Zaibach emperor's machine? Or was it something else that had been there all along?

"_Two easily swayed human hearts—"_

Hitomi gave a start and quickly sat up. Whose voice was that? "Who's there?" she called.

Was it another vision?

She closed her eyes and forced herself to concentrate, but she didn't see anything.

"Who's there?" she called again.

"Uh…Hitomi." In her eagerness to greet her soft, comfortable bed, Hitomi had neglected to close the door behind her. Now Van Slanzar de Fanel stood in the doorway, leaning with one hand on the doorframe, the light from the hall casting a long, Van-shaped shadow into her dark room.

"Van!" she cried with delight, and rose to meet him.

"Uh, Hitomi," he repeated, a little uncertainly. "I'm sorry for disturbing you at this hour."

"No, no, it's fine," she said shaking her head quickly so the bangs of her short hair swayed slightly from side to side. "Everyone is still enjoying themselves at the feast downstairs. I just got kind of tired after a while, that's all."

"I know what you mean. Allen's men are quite the rowdy lot."

Hitomi giggled at Van's honest assessment of the blond knight's band of men. The wine, on top of her fatigue, must be getting to her head. "Anyway, is there something you wanted to talk to me about?"

"Uh…that is…I…uh…" he began nervously, then stalled.

Even though his face was obscured by shadow, Hitomi thought she could see a hint of red. "You're not _blushing_, are you?" she teased.

"_Me?_ B-b-blushing? N-nothing of the sort!" he stammered as she took him by the shoulders and steered him backwards into the hallway, laughing all the while.

When they were both bathed in the light of the oil lamps, Hitomi poked him in the chest with her finger, smirking, and said, "See? I was right."

Van put a hand on his hip with as much nonchalance as he could muster, and turned his head to the side. But his blush only grew deeper. "So you were right. So what?"

"So nothing." Still giggling, she hung her arms around his neck. His heart skipped a beat. Hitomi was beautiful. She had let her short hair, which Van found strangely boyish at first, grow out a little and curl around her ears and her face in a decidedly feminine way. The diamonds she wore in her hair perfectly set off the deep rose color of her pendant, and their many facets glittered in the light, complementing her pale complexion. Her gown was light green, an elegant affair of satin and lace that brought out the green in her eyes, and the short sleeves that hung slightly off her shoulders exposed her neck in a way that invited his touch.

Though he could not feel it through his glove, he caressed her cheek and let his hand rest on the side of her neck. "Hitomi," he said simply.

It was Hitomi's turn to blush. "Van." He was gazing at her in earnest, with an intensity that she had never seen before. His face was not wearing his usual hard expression, but instead was something open and vulnerable. She had only seen him like this when he was around his brother, or when he was scared. And beyond the fear and openness, there was sadness so deep, so profound that she could not touch it, even if she had a million years. The sight of it cut her to the heart.

Trembling, she reached up and touched his hand. She tried to say something, but the words were stuck in her throat. Instead, she threw her arms around him and started to sob into his chest.

-

Awash in the light of the two moons, Van watched from a chair beside the bed as Hitomi slept. He had let her cry herself to the point of exhaustion, and then tucked her into bed. But he did not leave, since he did not know if this would be the last time he saw her. In fact, that was what he originally wanted to talk to her about, but things just happened to turn out differently.

At first, he had been surprised by her outburst, but he supposed that if he were in her place, he would be rather emotional as well. As it was, he was feeling frayed at the edges, but his upbringing—and necessity—had taught him to hold it in, to keep it together, because people looked up to him and there would not always be someone he could rely upon, not even Hitomi. But it was better that way. She was his friend, not his crutch. That had been a difficult lesson, but a necessary one. He needed her power, that was true, but he also needed her for much more than that.

Van leaned back in the chair and observed the moons that hung in Gaea's sky. One was small and pearly, and gleamed like a white marble, a child's plaything. The other was more formidable, covered in swirls of blue and white, like the murky depths of a crystal ball, mysterious and indecipherable. The corner of his mouth quirked into a smile. A fortune-teller who descended from a world shaped like a giant crystal ball. It seemed that someone out there had a sense of humor.

Then his smile faded. Sooner or later, she would have to return to the Mystic Moon, the world she called Earth.

Or would she?

He shook his head vigorously as if to drive away that thought. Of course she would go back. She had a father, mother, and brother—a family—waiting for her at home. How many times in the course of their journey had she talked about wanting to go home? She had shed tears about it, and she had even been sent back once, her desire was so strong.

But she had come back. She had come back for him.

He remembered their second meeting, which had been almost identical to the first: a shaft of white light, Hitomi in the strange clothes that people wore on the Mystic Moon, running toward him as fast as she could. The first time, they collided, and she slapped him. But the second time, she was expecting him, and she was smiling. His heart warmed at the memory.

"_But can this single moment last forever?"_

A voice, old and worn, pierced through his thoughts, echoing at the edge of his mind. Sitting bolt upright in the chair, Van scanned the dark room, trying to detect the smallest movement in the shadows. He rose immediately and his hand went to the hilt of his sword, which hung in its sheath at his waist. "Who's there?" he said sharply.

Hitomi, who had been disturbed by either the strange voice or by Van's reaction, stirred and opened her eyes. Upon seeing Van tense and defensive, her heart jumped in alarm. "Van, what's wrong?"

He did not respond, and continued to glare about the room. After a moment, he relaxed and returned to his seat. "It was nothing. I must be imagining things." Hitomi was still staring at him, not entirely reassured. Van tried to soften his expression and said, "Well, the war is over now, so it's not like anyone is going to try to kidnap you anymore. So don't worry."

Hitomi sat up at the edge of the bed and cocked her head to the side. "'No one will try to kidnap you anymore.' How's _that_ supposed to make me feel better?"

"Ah…well…" He scratched his head. "It's _true_, isn't it?"

She laughed, the tinkling of chimes in the night air. "I'm just teasing you, silly! I mean, seeing you act like there's a land dragon about to eat us isn't the easiest thing to wake up to, you know."

Now that she was awake, his spirits lifted and he was able to forget his brooding thoughts for the moment. "Sorry, Hitomi," he said with a small smile. "I guess I do it out of habit."

"It's ok," she said. "I'm sorry I fell asleep like that. And….for crying like that. I don't know what came over me. It's just that so many things have happened, and—"

Van reached out and took her hand. "It's all right. Don't worry about it."

_It's all right, he says_, Hitomi thought, watching him. But from the slant of his eyebrows, from the serious set of his mouth, she could tell there was something on his mind. "Van, what is it? What's wrong?"

"Hitomi…" he began, focusing his eyes on the ground. He paused, and seemed to gather the courage for what he was about to say. "Hitomi. Now that the war is over…you…your power…we don't need it…not anymore…I mean…"

Abruptly he looked up at her, and the moon shining through the windows behind her reflected off eyes that were as brown as oak but as soft as a sunflower's center. "Where are you going to go?" he said, almost fiercely.

Hitomi recoiled at the harshness of his question, and her hands automatically flew to her pendant. "That's right…Gaea doesn't need my power anymore." _Stupid girl, why hadn't I thought of this before?_ "In fact, it's better for me to leave before anyone else gets hurt because of it."

"No, no, that's not what I mean," Van interrupted, agitated.

Hitomi blinked in confusion and waited for him to continue.

More gently, he said, "I mean…what I'm trying to say…" He pulled his chair closer, so that their knees were almost touching. Then, with head bent as if in defeat, he laid his hands on her shoulders. "Don't…don't go," he begged.

She put her hands on his wrists and moved them up his bare arms. They were practically embracing, now, and she was close enough that she could peer through the long, dark bangs that hung in front of his bent face. Even then, it was so dark that she could only see slivers of his cheeks, the bridge of his nose, the slight curve of his upper lip. Leaning forward, she felt their noses touch and she closed her eyes. Shortly thereafter, his lips brushed hers, and then, somewhat hesitantly, found them again, and they kissed, slowly and tenderly.

When they finally separated, they held each other more closely, and Hitomi leaned her head on his shoulder. Her heart was pounding faster than it had with Amano or even with Allen.

"You won't go…will you?" Van whispered in her ear. His breath on her earlobe was like a warm caress.

_No, I don't want to go. I want to stay here with you, like this, forever_. A week ago, her answer would have been the reverse. That was when she had become so tired of constant bloodshed, so homesick, that she literally wished herself back home. There was nothing holding her back, not even Allen. Not Van, either. She had not considered Van, or realized that she missed him until she saw the tarot card with the serpent and began to see the feathers. His feathers.

She had always assumed that she would go back. Now, assumption gave way to uncertainty and new-found desire.

Earth or Van? At the moment, the choice seemed obvious.

However…

Hitomi rose from the edge of the bed and took his hand. "Van, come with me."

She led him to the tall French doors that opened onto the balcony, and stepped outside. The night was warm, and the breeze carried the faint scent of roasting meat and the distant sounds of merrymaking far below.

Pointing at the sky, Hitomi said, "Look, there's the Earth, and there's the Moon—the one we both share. In our sky, there's only one moon."

"Your world is beautiful."

As they both gazed at Earth, Hitomi felt a wave of nostalgia and longing. Somewhere out there was her family, her friends, all wondering where she was and if they would ever see her again. There, her school, the track team, her future were all waiting for her. Her world, where animals did not walk and talk, where people did not eat worms on a stick or fight with swords and giant suits of armor. Where Atlantis was a myth long-forgotten and machines that controlled destiny did not exist. That was her world, and she missed it.

But she liked Gaea, and she liked Fanelia. Besides, Princess Mellerna was more than willing to throw everything away for her love for Allen: her kingdom, her status, her honor. There was no reason why Hitomi could not do the same, selfish though it may be. Standing here on Gaea, gazing at Earth from afar, it would be so easy.

And even if she stayed here, it was not like she couldn't go back. All it took was one wish, and she would be in the school infirmary, having collapsed during track practice, with Amano-senpai standing watchfully over her. Not a single moment would have passed. But every day she stayed on Gaea was one day more of her desire to be with Van and one day less of her wish to return home. Then the day would come when her wish to go home would no longer be strong enough to send her back. And even if she were able to go return, would she go back just as she was, or as a middle-aged woman, or with snow-white hair? She would look out of place at Kamakita High as a bent-over old woman, that was certain.

There were no what-ifs or maybes. There was only one choice for Hitomi: to go or to stay. For Van, she was willing to stay.

But there was one other thing. That one thing was what she heard, drifting up to the balcony from the festivities below.

"…can see the future…"

"…power of Atlantis…"

"…single-handedly destroyed the emperor's machine!"

"…Atlantis is on her side!"

"…our Goddess of Victory…"

The praises of Allen's men, though well-intentioned, sparked rumors that flew about the banquet hall like flies on a hot summer day. She had heard them earlier, too, during the feast, and being present when people were saying things like that about her made it that much more embarrassing to bear. And if rumor traveled that fast within the space of just a few hours, who knew how far they would fly in days, weeks, or years.

"Do you hear that, Van? What they're saying about my power?"

Van nodded. "You're afraid that people might start another war and try to use you." He protectively put an arm around her shoulders. "But I won't let that happen. I won't let anyone take you away from me."

Hitomi shook her head. "That's not all, Van." She slipped out from under his arm and grasped his hands, facing him. "I have the power of Atlantis," she said gravely. "I have the power to shape the future."

"What do you mean?"

"All the visions I had, about people dying or cities being destroyed…all those things happened because of me!"

Van smiled tolerantly at her distress. "Hitomi, being able to see those things doesn't make it your fault."

"Van, when we were in Atlantis, I saw your mother."

He blinked. "My mother?"

"Yes. The same way you saw Balgus, and Allen saw his father. Your mother spoke to me. She told me about my power, because her ancestors were from Atlantis. My visions are not just visions. They are my wishes and my thoughts that eventually come true. I helped to bring about the death and tragedy that I saw."

"But how can that be? Your visions have saved us so many times—"

"No, Van. I was only able to save people by preventing my visions from coming true. Otherwise, my visions would have killed them."

"How is that possible, Hitomi? You've never wished for someone to die, or for anything that happened during the war. If anything, you probably wished for the war to end."

"That's true, but whole time I was here, I was so anxious and worried about the people around me that I started to see all the bad things that could happen to them. My fears became true because I made them come true."

She was holding on to his hands so tightly now that her knuckles were turning white. Without looking at him, she said, "I was the reason why you almost died so many times. So many of my visions were about you, Van. I didn't realize it, but I was always thinking about you, worrying about you. Because of that, I was always putting you in danger."

When Van didn't say anything, Hitomi worried that she might have upset him. _I should probably say something…maybe I should apologize._ "Van, I—"

"Because of you, I could see the invisible Guymelefs." Surprised, Hitomi looked up to find him gazing at her the same way he did earlier, softly and quietly. "You were the reason why Dilandau couldn't kill me."

Awkwardly, he drew her closer and put one arm, and then the other, around her. Hitomi sniffled and wrapped her arms around his back, and she buried her face in his shoulder. The wool of his shirt scratched against her face, but in a way she found comforting. Despite her visions, he didn't hate her for what came of them. She closed her eyes and let herself drift in his warmth.

"You also saved me from the land dragon," Van said at length.

Hitomi lifted her head to look at him. "The land dragon?"

"The first time we met. Do you remember?"

"Oh, yeah," she said, remembering how gruffly he had treated her then.

"You slapped me, too."

"Uh…yeah." Looking back, she actually found it kind of funny, but her cheeks burned nonetheless. Why did he have to bring it up now?

"I probably deserved it. I never really thanked you, did I?"

Balgus had, but Van had not. So that was why. Hitomi gave a little sniff, feigning indignance. "Hmph. No, I don't think you did."

Van stepped back and held her by the shoulders. He was wearing the same red shirt, laced halfway up the front, that he had on when Hitomi first met him. In fact, everything about his appearance was almost identical to the way he looked back then, except that he was a little older, a little more battle-worn now. "Hitomi, thank you for saving me from being killed and eaten by the land dragon. I'm also sorry for being so rude to you. Will you forgive me?"

Hitomi crossed an arm over her waist and tapped her chin thoughtfully. "Normally, I'd say yes…but I'll have to think about it."

"But—But I said I was sorry!" he protested. Then he seemed to realize something, and he shook his head. "I mean, I said thank you!"

_He is way too easy to tease_, Hitomi thought. Grinning impishly, she said, "Well…I suppose you'll just have to do better next time."

Van looked at her, half-perplexed, half-annoyed at losing to her at bantering. Then, without warning, he lowered his head and covered her mouth with his lips, leaving Hitomi stunned. When her heart started to beat again, she put her hands on his chest and returned his kiss.

When they broke away, he leaned his forehead on top of hers. "Is that better?" he murmured.

"M-much better," she managed to say, before becoming lost in another kiss.

He was also more charming than before. If only just a little.

-

Several hours later found the young couple huddled together on the balcony, watching the moons and the stars as they told each other stories of their worlds and the lives they led. Hitomi discovered that there were still many things she did not know about Gaea, despite having been there for over half a year. Van, on the other hand, knew next to nothing about Earth, and was intensely curious about people who could travel long distances in machines called _cars_, heat up food in a matter of seconds, or talk to each other from halfway across the world. To him, her world on the Mystic Moon was nothing short of magical.

Hitomi had brought out a blanket and some pillows so they could sit on the stone balcony a little more comfortably. She had also changed (with Van having his back turned, blushing fiercely) into her running t-shirt and shorts, which she often wore to bed because they were more comfortable than her school uniform and more familiar than the nightgowns proffered to her by the palace maids. Now they were sitting on the blanket and pillows, Hitomi leaning against him and Van with his arm around her.

When their conversation lulled, Van shifted his position and unwound his arm. Hitomi watched as he hunched forward and slowly pulled off his gloves, as if he were contemplating something.

"Hitomi."

"Yes, Van?"

"Are you…you're going back, aren't you."

"Yes," she replied sadly. There was really no other choice. For either of them.

"I see," he said without turning around.

_Is he mad at me? _"Van…it's not like I don't want to stay," Hitomi said pleadingly. "It's true that I miss my family and I miss home, but if I stay, you might get hurt. I don't want to lose you like that, I don't want to lose you because of—"

"Hitomi!" he said suddenly, whirling on her.

She shrank back in surprise. "Y-Yes?" she said faintly.

His hand clenched, then unclenched. "You don't need to explain. I…I understand," he finally said. Seeing her startled expression, he ducked his head and looked away. "I didn't mean to scare you. I'm sorry."

Hitomi picked up his hand and pressed it to her cheek. It was very warm, and it smelled of leather laced with sweat. Calluses on his palms and fingers from swordfighting felt rough against her skin, alternating with the softer patches that had been protected by his glove. That seemed to give Van the courage to face her again. Carefully, almost shyly, he trailed his fingers across her cheek, over her lips, down her throat, each one a new discovery. He traced the ridge of her collarbone and his hand came to rest on the side of her neck. Hitomi reached up with her own hand and parted her fingers through his hair, thick and unruly and windblown. Slowly, he leaned into her and she closed her eyes. Their lips touched, bittersweet, and then she found herself in his arms. He laid his cheek against her neck and held her without saying anything.

Hitomi hugged him tightly and fought away the tears that blurred her vision. This was probably one of the last times she would be able to be with him before she left. But everything they had done together, everything they had been through, would be etched indelibly in her heart. Neither time nor space would make her forget.

But as long she was still here, she would remain with him. "Van," she said, her voice catching. "I…I'd like to see your wings again. Please."

Van pulled away. He shrugged off his shirt, and there was a flash of white as two wings, pure and snowy, blossomed from his back. They stretched out, beautiful and soft, the wings of an angel. Hitomi reached out, her hand hovering uncertainly. She had never touched them before. But Van didn't move to stop her, so she brushed her fingers gingerly along the feathers. It was like touching down, the soft underbelly of a dove. Then his wings moved, around her and behind her, the feathers floating down like a snowstorm. He took her by the arms and let his forehead fall gently onto her shoulder. "I'll never let you go," he said quietly.

They held each other, the feathers drifting down upon them, the angel and the girl from the Mystic Moon. They held each other, surrounded by an unearthly glow that belonged to the stars and the heavens. They held each other until the morning light, like it was the last night of the world.


	2. Awakening Need

**The Last Night of the World**

**Chapter 1**

**Awakening Need**

-

"_Can this single moment last forever?  
This moment, created by  
Two easily swayed human hearts?"  
- Isaac Dornkirk, Emperor of Zaibach during the Great War of Gaea_

-

_Five years later…_

It was mid-summer, and the streets of Tokyo bustled with throngs of people. Children pulled on their mothers' skirts, begging for an ice cream cone; gaggles of schoolgirls _oohed_ and _aahed_ over the latest fads displayed by merchants eager for their business; and lovers sauntered by, hand-in-hand, their parasols shielding them from the hot sun and sheltering them in a world of their own. The air was filled with the busy chatter of a city filled with millions of people whose lives constantly intersected with one other, whose encounters were often of little consequence, catching only glimpses of the stories of strangers.

One shop window held a display of rows of plates and platters, neatly lined up behind each other on a swath of blue-and-white silk, standing on their edges to catch the attention of passers-by. A young woman with two long, brown braids of hair underneath a wide-brimmed hat stood at the window, perusing the china.

_This china is too nice to for me to just walk away without thinking about it. But it must be so expensive!_ She touched the small red purse that hung by a strap from her left shoulder, and the sun glinted off a ring on her hand. _There's no way we can afford it. Might as well add it to the bridal registry._

As she turned to enter the shop, something made her pause. The woman stepped closer to the glass and touched it with her hand. On one of the plates, which was snow-white with a molded border, was the raised detail of single feather, centered at the bottom.

The windowpane reflected green eyes that were filled with uncertainty. What was this sudden feeling of unease? It had been five years already, and it wasn't like her to swoon at the sight of every feather she came across. In front of her, the three diamonds on the ring she wore on her finger seemed to wink knowingly.

She had her own life—didn't she?

She was happy—wasn't she?

Without a backward glance, Kanzaki Hitomi turned on her heel and ran.

-

"Your Majesty!"

Van Slanzar de Fanel looked up in surprise as the great doors to the throne room crashed open. One of the pages, a mere boy of fifteen, collapsed to one knee and bowed his head in genuflection, breathing heavily from exertion.

"Your Majesty!" the boy exclaimed, between breaths. "Fanelia…Fanelia is falling as we speak…as if by some invisible force!"

Van was on his feet in an instant. He gave a quick nod to each of the Basram diplomats before him. "Take to your ships and flee as fast as possible. We will continue this discussion later."

The two willowy men murmured in assent and hastily scurried off.

As he ran down the throne room, he called for his generals. "Sabin! Maltek!" he barked, and two men in hulking armor appeared at his side.

"Yes, Majesty!"

"Yes, Sir!"

"Sabin, I want you to reinforce the troops at the garrisons and hold off the enemy to the best of your ability. Maltek, I'd like you to lead the First and Second Divisions in a repartee and report back to me immediately with anything you find."

"Yes, Your Highness," the two samurai replied in unison, and split off in different directions.

Van continued to run, tightly grasping the hilt of his sword, until he reached the palace gates. There, from atop the vista that overlooked the city below, the full extent of the destruction was made clear: towers, once proud and strong, crumbled as if made of sand; bridges collapsed as if from a crushing weight; and buildings toppled into the streets onto the townspeople fleeing in terror.

His knees trembled, and he staggered as though he had been punched in the gut. _No…not again! Please, not again! _

Then, gritting his teeth, he sprinted for the Guymelef enclosure, where Escaflowne was held, past the creaking ranks of mechanical armor that were mobilizing for battle. _Is it Zaibach? No, that can't be. They've lost their top military tacticians, and Emperor Dornkirk has been dead for years. Dilandau no longer exists, either. None of the other nations are advanced enough to produce cloaking devices. So who on Gaea could have created more invisible Guymelefs?_

When Van reached the enclosure, he scrambled to the pedestal in the middle of the building, nestled inside ring after ring of white-and-green metal bands, which he fancied operated like the cogs of a giant clockwork machine. On the small round platform, there was now a stone chest engraved with the royal crest of Fanelia. He slipped his fingers under the edge of the crest and it snapped up like a latch, uncovering a keyhole. Reaching inside his robes, he produced a large keyring and selected a long gold key, unscratched and untarnished from disuse, bearing the same crest. He inserted it into the chest and turned it until he felt a _click_, and then opened the lid.

Inside, resting in a cushioned hollow in the stone casing, was a Drag-energist, the same one he had used to power Escaflowne in the Great War of Gaea. He picked it up. It lay heavily in his hand; its warmth was unsettling, and it seemed to pulse dimly. With a flick of his thumb, Van exposed the blade of his sword. _That was a long time ago, so I'd better make sure to do it again_, he thought, and slit the fleshy part of his thumb on the blade. He let the blood run down his hand onto the energist, which glowed more brightly as it gained life from his blood.

Standing up, Van held the flesh-colored orb high above his head, pointing it at a boulder the size of a small building that hung suspended from the high, vaulted ceiling. _This is exactly like that time, five years ago,_ he thought. The enclosure, with its entrance directed away from the valley, was almost impermeable to the sounds of fighting below. The silence in the spacious chamber was resounding. _Except…there's only me, now_. He closed his eyes and touched the front of his robe, fingers resting on the small bulge of the rose-colored pendant that he wore underneath.

_Hitomi…_

The memory of Hitomi struck at his heart—the limpid green of her eyes, her gentle smile; and suddenly, an inexplicable fear consumed him. His grip on the energist weakened, and his hand fell to his side like a heavy weight. He fell to his knees, breathless, clutching his chest, and the energist rolled out of his hand and onto one of the metal belts that encircled the pedestal.

_Get a hold of yourself, Van! You can't lose your head like this in the middle of a crisis!_

Fighting the terrible fear welling up inside of him, Van stumbled to where the energist had fallen and retrieved it. He climbed back up on the pedestal and held the glowing ball aloft.

"I, Van Fanel, King of Fanelia," he began, his voice cracking. He swallowed, and then more firmly, continued. "I bind myself by blood pact to thee, Escaflowne! Thou sleeping dragon, awake!"

The energist glowed even brighter, until it illuminated the enclosure like a small sun, and the painted metal belts around the pedestal groaned and whirred into motion. The whole building shook with the force of the mechanical awakening, and cracks began to snake their way through the rugged surface of the rock above him. With a sound like thunder, the rock split into pieces, hurtling away into the far reaches of the room. Van shielded his face from the debris raining down on him as the ivory hulk of Escaflowne, the dragon armor of Fanelia, descended in all its legendary glory.

It landed, resting on one knee, with the other bent as if providing a platform to allow Van easier access to the hexagonal energist chamber on its chest. Van climbed up the leg and leaped up so he was level with the chamber, which began to glow as he came near. He inserted the energist, hand and all, pushing through the crimson chamber as though trying to move through congealed blood. Once it was in place, he removed his hand and absent-mindedly gave it a flick as if shaking off the sticky blood of the dragon's heart.

The energist, a dark, round shadow in the middle of the chamber, began to pulse. Escaflowne's heartbeat. _My heartbeat_. With a swift motion, Van cast off his cumbersome ceremonial robes, the ones he wore when receiving an audience, uncovering a green, sleeveless tunic, tied with a belt around the waist, and black silk pants tucked into the tops of brown, ornamented leather boots. Not the most appropriate attire for waging war, but that was the best he could do, for now.

The cockpit of the Guymelef opened with a _hiss _on Van's silent command, and he was about to jump inside when the energist chamber began to glow brightly, increasing in intensity until its pulsing heart was all he could see.

_What the… _

Hitomi's pendant, which lay on his chest from a chain around his neck, floated in front of him, its rosy jewel barely penetrating the crimson light that flooded his vision. Then, it too began to emit its own light, pulsing with the energist as if communicating with it in some ancient, forgotten language.

_What's going on?_

There was the sensation of movement, of something drawing him upwards, but his feet remained firmly planted on Escaflowne's surface. And just when Van thought things could not get any more bizarre, there was a sudden flash of hot, white light, and everything—Escaflowne, the pendant, his own hand—disappeared from view.

-

Hitomi ran as fast as she could. She had hitched up the skirt of her yellow sundress with one hand to keep it from getting tangled between her legs. When she neared the intersection, a large grocery truck roared by in front of her, forcing her to veer left at the corner. Her purse flapped behind her like a helpless banner, and her sandals beat against the sun-baked pavement in a panicked rhythm. She ignored the cries of surprise and outrage from the people she pushed by. There were even some shouts of "Hey, lady! What's wrong?" Children scattered before her like frightened birds, and people stopped and stared. Yet she continued to run.

Why she was running, she could not say, except that fear, rooted somewhere deep inside, had bloomed like a nightshade and would not release her from its poisonous tendrils. And where could she run to? After all, the source of her flight was inside of her, and all the kilometers in the world could not put any distance between them. But run she must, out of instinct, out of desperation.

She did not know how far she had gone, but she found herself in a small park at the edge of the district. Her heart felt as if it were about to burst, but she did not slow down. Then, a blinding shaft of light pierced the ground in front of her, a jagged line dividing her vision in half.

_Lightning?_ was her last rational thought before momentum propelled her headlong into the blast. Briefly, she saw the angular outline of a familiar, otherworldly giant, and a man with a head of black hair. Her heart leaped at the sight of the proud angle of his jaw, the slope of his nose, the elegant slant of his eyebrows; her heart leapt, but the gut-wrenching fear grew deeper and spread to her belly, bubbling up through her stomach and threatening to swallow her. Her steps began to falter.

"Van?" she gasped.

The young man with Van's face seemed perplexed, but he reached down with his hand. "Hitomi?"

Without really thinking about why, she reached up in response. Their hands came into contact, and Hitomi's arm threatened to wrench out of its socket as she suddenly decelerated and was hauled up onto the armored giant. As the beam of light engulfed her, her only sensations were of the cool metal surface of Escaflowne's knee and the taut tendons of Van's forearm as she clung to him, trying not to fall off as she was spirited away to Gaea, the land of the two moons, of the dreams of Atlantis, of the skies where angels flew, once upon a time.


	3. Return to Gaea

Author's edit 6/11/06: I rewrote the second half of this chapter and cleaned it up a little.**  
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-**  
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**  
The Last Night of the World**

**Chapter 2**

**Return to Gaea**

-

They landed with a jaw-rattling jolt. Hitomi's legs began to slide off Escaflowne, one followed by the other, and she knew she was going to fall. She tried to hold on tighter to Van, but the impact had loosened her grip on him as well, and her fingers slipped over his wrist and grasped only air.

"Van!" she shrieked as she plummeted to the ground.

"Hitomi!" Van leaped down after her, but no matter how far Hitomi stretched her arm, he seemed to be just out of reach.

There was the sound of someone running below, and Hitomi landed against something that felt like two metal bars across her shoulders and underneath her knees. When she saw a man's face looking down at her, she realized that he was the one who had caught her. His hair, the color of sand in the surf, was parted on the left and swept across his brow like a wave in still motion. "Are you all right, Miss?"

"I'm fine. Thank you." He helped her to her feet, and she saw that he was really only a boy, a teenager whose limbs seemed far too gangly to bear the heavy armor he wore.

_A boy wearing armor? _Now that the ground was firmly beneath her feet, she took in her surroundings for the first time. She was in the middle of a town, a city, and it looked like someone had taken a wrecking ball and swung it haphazardly about. Some buildings were missing their upper stories, some had completely collapsed, and the rest were missing corners and eaves as if they had only taken a glancing blow.

Van rushed to her side. "Hitomi, are you all right?"

"Yes, I'm fine." _Fine _was relative. Where were they? She was certain they were on Gaea, because nobody lived in buildings of wood and bamboo tiles on Earth anymore. But was it Palas? Freid? Or—she almost dared not think it—Fanelia?

Van turned to the boy; he recognized him as the same page who had announced the attack on Fanelia earlier. "What's your name?" he asked.

"It's Ardonis, Your Majesty."

"Ardonis, I want you to take her to safety, with the other women and children. Quickly!"

The youth saluted smartly. "Yes, Sir!" he said, and led Hitomi by the hand in the direction of the hills.

"Van-sama!" came a deep voice, and several men rushed up, their armored steps clanking together in a wartime chorus.

The one in front was a middle-aged, balding man with a neck nearly as thick as his head, and whose leathery, sun-beaten face bore several pale scars. "General Maltek. What's the situation?"

"Your Highness, it is most puzzling. We were able to find no enemy soldiers, invisible or otherwise." As he spoke, his bushy golden mustache moved with his mouth, and his brow was furrowed like a farmer's plowed field. "There is not a single scratch on our troops or our Guymelefs. It's as if the city was falling by itself!"

"Falling by itself…" Van echoed, dumbfounded. He took a step forward and listened carefully. There was no sound of fighting, no clash of steel on steel, no roar of fire consuming the city, no screams of dying soldiers. There was not even the sound of buildings crashing to the ground, he realized. It was eerily silent. He could hear the birds chirping.

"It stopped," he said. He took another step forward, as if doing so would reveal the sights and sounds of battle, for some reason hidden from him. But there was nothing. "It stopped," he repeated. Then, addressing his General, "When? When did this happen?"

Maltek huffed through his great mustache in bafflement. "Only just now, my Lord. We saw a beam of light striking from the heavens and we hurried over, to find you and Escaflowne and the lady over there."

It was then that Van noticed Hitomi had not left and was standing next to Ardonis, watching him. Hitomi, who did not look like the Hitomi he knew five years ago.

Having only been king for half a decade, he was at a loss for what to do. Then again, even the battle experience of half a century probably would not have prepared him for a scenario like this.

But he had to do something. "Maltek. I want you and Sabin to bolster our defenses and be on the lookout for enemy activity and report to me anything that appears suspicious. Alert the rest who are on active duty to march at a moment's notice and put the reserve on standby. We'll regroup in the palace when the preparations are finished."

Maltek and his men saluted and dispersed. "Ardonis, I want you to go with them," Van said to the page. The young man with sandy hair saluted and followed on Maltek's heels.

Now that they were alone, Hitomi—Hitomi with the long braids, the yellow dress—trotted up to him. "Van, what in the world happened here?" Her green eyes looked up at him, bright and deep and disarming in their clarity. This was Hitomi, no doubt about it.

"I don't know," he said numbly, and gazed at the ruins of his city. There was nobody left; all of Fanelia's citizens had been evacuated by now. The jagged rooftops reached for the sky, cruelly cut down in their noble attempt to stand tall. The birds continued to chirp and fly across the sun as if nothing had happened. A lonely ache began to fill his heart. "I don't know."

Without a word, Hitomi slipped her fingers into his palm and squeezed his hand.

-

They walked back to the palace, hand in hand. If the soldiers noticed, they didn't comment. But Van knew that before they reached the Inner Palace, rumors would already be flying through the barracks.

Of all the structures within Fanelia, only the palace remained untouched: another mystery to add to the day's growing list. He pushed open the door to his private sitting room, still holding Hitomi by the hand. She was back—he could hardly believe it. She was back, and he was not going to let her go. He knew better than that, now.

Facing her, he gazed at her more closely, more leisurely. Two long braids trailed over her shoulders, and the wispy strands around her face danced like threads of gold in the sunlight. He was more used to the Hitomi with short hair, but long hair suited her in her blossoming womanhood. "Hitomi," he said, his voice welling up expectantly.

"Van," she replied, her eyes wide and liquid like those of a frightened deer. Was she nervous? Well, nervous was understandable. He was nervous, too. They had not seen each other for five years. Where to begin? He tried to speak, but his tongue stuck to the roof of his mouth.

"Van-samaaaa!" cried a shrill voice, and the door to the room burst open. In bounded a girl who was marked like a tabby cat, the ringlets of her short pink hair bobbing with unbridled joy as she smothered Van in her embrace. "Van-sama, I was so scared! I thought it was Zaibach all over again!"

"Whoa, easy, Merle!" he laughed, as she licked his face incessantly.

"_Merle?_"

The cat-girl released Van to scrutinize the other person in the room. Hitomi could hardly believe that the creature in front of her—tall, curvy, and slender—was the same Merle who used to follow Van around like an oversized housecat. In a very feline manner, she cocked her head to the side, as if trying to remember something. Then her eyes sparkled with recognition. "_Hitomi?_" she exclaimed.

"That's right."

"Hitomiiiii!" she shrieked, and threw her arms around Hitomi with such exuberance that Hitomi staggered backward. Soon her face was covered with the affectionate kisses of the cat's sandpaper tongue. Some things, it seemed, never changed. "Hitomi, you've come back! Now Van-sama won't be lonely anymore!"

"Now, Merle, that's enough," Van said, flushing faintly at her last remark as he tried to peel her off Hitomi.

"You're not going to leave again, are you? You came back for Van-sama, didn't you?" Merle asked, barely able to contain her excitement in her rapidly swishing tail.

"Ah…yes," Hitomi replied, forcing a smile. She quickly covered her left hand, but too late; Merle had already caught sight of the ring.

The cat-girl narrowed her eyes, no longer an affectionate tabby, but a hunting cat that had spotted its prey. "What is—"

"Merle," Van interrupted. "Is that a message for me?"

"Oh!" Merle had almost forgotten about the folded piece of paper in her hand. Promptly, she handed it to Van, who broke the seal and skimmed the contents. "Hmph. Those fellows from Basram, treating me like I'm some messenger," she complained, and then glanced slyly at Hitomi. "But I wonder what was so important about their message."

Clearly, there was something going on that Hitomi was not aware of. Van folded up the letter and put it in his pants pocket. "Thank you, Merle. I'll talk to you later, ok?"

"Yes, Van-sama," she said, ducking her head. She bounded back out of the room, but not before casting one last, hard look at Hitomi.

When Merle was gone, Hitomi righted her braids—which had been knocked askew by the cat's affections—and said, "What was _that_ all about?"

"Nothing. Nothing important, anyway," he replied. Fanelia was falling and Hitomi had come back. He needed to sit down. Taking Hitomi's hand, he led her to the couch.

They sat facing each other, Hitomi with her hands folded demurely in her lap. "There might be another war," he explained. Though what Van really wanted to say was how happy he was that Hitomi was back, how confused and shocked he was by the attack on Fanelia. But the words wouldn't form. So instead, he talked about the only thing he knew how."The past five years have been peaceful, but there have been political tensions."

Hitomi nodded, remembering all too well the mass anarchy that took place within the Zone of Absolute Fortune five years ago. After all the backstabbing and massacres, it made sense for the nations of Gaea to eye each other uneasily. "Who do you think was behind the attack?"

Van shook his head. "I don't know. Daedalus, Cesario, Egzardia? It could have been anyone."

"You don't think it could be Zaibach again, could it?"

"Probably not. Their forces were nearly decimated during the war, and they signed a treaty with the allied nations that imposed rather strict reparations."

"They might hold some resentment against you, then," Hitomi suggested.

"Maybe. I won't be able to say for sure until I know what my generals found."

_Oh no, Van,_ Hitomi thought to herself, watching him carefully as he spoke, his expression stoic and measured in the face of everything that had happened. _I can't believe Fanelia is being destroyed again, not after all you've been through during the war._

"But Hitomi," he said, and there was something about the way he said her name that made her feel like they were sitting closer than they really were. "When you came, the fighting stopped."

"It did?" she said, surprised.

Van nodded. "I don't want you be involved in another war, but…" He gazed intently at her, the brown of his eyes dark with unspoken emotion. "I'm glad that you've come back."

"Me too," Hitomi said, even as her stomach turned uneasily. Being back on Gaea, in Fanelia, with Van, was impossible. But here he was, in front of her, a vision from another life. He looked no different from the way he did five years ago—except maybe he was a little taller—and he was so close that she could touch him. She could easily close the distance between them and even kiss him if she wanted to. _Kiss him? Why am I thinking about kissing him?_

But when Van's fingers closed around her hand, when he leaned a little closer, kissing him was all Hitomi could think about. As though her body were acting on its own, she reached out for his arm. Her heart beat fast as he lowered his head and his lips tentatively brushed her forehead.

Suddenly the ring around her finger felt too heavy and too tight. "Van," she mumbled, wanting to say something about…

He slowly moved down her nose, her skin tingling at his touch. _About what?_ she wondered vaguely, tilting her head up to meet him. He found her mouth, and soon she forgot about wanting to say anything at all.

At last they parted, and they held each other, Hitomi with her head on Van's chest. As she listened to rise and fall of his breath, the quiet beating of his heart, she could not deny that Van felt very real. She closed her eyes and tried to ignore the small voice in the back of her mind, the one that kept bringing up the band of gold and diamond on her hand. If this was a dream, it was not one she wanted to wake up from, not yet. _But if this is a dream…what am I doing, dreaming about Van?_

Hitomi shifted in his arms and sat up straighter. She opened her mouth to tell him about her, about what had changed over the last five years, but her eyes strayed to a slender gold chain around his neck that dipped into the front of his shirt. Her heart quickened again. _Could it be…? _

So instead, she asked, "What is that you're wearing around your neck?"

"Oh, you mean this?" He hooked a finger under the chain and lifted a rosy jewel tipped with gold from under his shirt, holding it up for her to see. "It's the pendant you gave me. But here, I should give it back to you," he said, taking it off. "It belongs to you, after all."

He looped it over Hitomi's head, carefully threading her braids through the chain, and adjusted the pendant until the jewel was centered on her chest. There came a knock at the door.

"Enter," Van called.

Merle appeared from behind the door, this time with more self-restraint. She stared for a moment at the way Van held his hands on Hitomi's shoulders, his thumbs resting on her collarbone. Then, bowing, she said, "Van-sama, the generals are ready to call a meeting."

"Thank you, Merle." He stood, and Hitomi rose with him. "And before you go, please show Hitomi to her room."

One of her ears gave a twitch, and a self-satisfied look crossed Merle's features. "Of course, Van-sama."


	4. Visions of Destruction

Author's note: I just love the Escaflowne soundtrack. Heck, I just love Escaflowne.

-

**The Last Night of the World**

**Chapter 3**

**Visions of Destruction**

-

Hitomi followed Merle, who led her through hallways festooned with tapestries boldly displaying the crests of the noble houses of Fanelia. They passed unicorns, serpents, and lions, all wielding or entwined with swords, spears or the house's historic weapon of choice. Others were designed more like symbols, like the stylized triangular dragon's head of Fanelia, ornamented with precious metals or gems.

Merle walked in front of her, her tabby-striped tail swinging slowly from side to side, as if biding its time. It poked out from under the skirt of a dark maize-colored dress that complemented her golden fur and accentuated a rather comely figure. She now resembled Naria—the cat-woman who tried to kidnap Hitomi for Folken, Van's brother—much more closely than the twelve-year-old kitten that Hitomi had known. It was amazing how much Merle had matured in the last few years. She wondered if Van had noticed the change, too.

Thinking of Van, Hitomi guiltily touched the ring on her left hand. Part of her clung to disbelief like a buoy in unfamiliar waters. There was no way this could be happening. It was far too similar to what had happened five years ago. Running and meeting Van in a sudden beam of light. Fanelia falling to an invisible enemy. Escaflowne. None of this was real; it had to be a dream. Some of the people had grown up, gotten older, but that was expected. Of course her mind would try to make Merle look like Naria. That was only logical. This had to be a dream, something that her mind, tired from the stresses of planning the wedding, had concocted from the recesses of her memory.

But as she trained her eyes on Merle's tail, watching its measured progress like a furry windshield wiper, she began to feel nauseous. A nagging feeling said that this wasn't a dream at all. The diamonds of her ring pressed into her palm. _Yutaro…_ she thought, twisting it around on her finger. _What am I going to do?_ she silently asked herself.

"I've seen it, you know," Merle said, all of a sudden.

Hitomi nearly choked, and squeezed her hands together to keep them still. "S-Seen what?"

Still facing ahead, Merle blew a disgusted sound through her lips. "Your ring, of course. Don't bother trying to hide it—from me, anyway."

Red-faced, Hitomi slipped off the ring and dropped it inside her purse, which had miraculously survived the transition from Earth to Gaea. She had lost her hat long before, sometime during her frenzied flight through Tokyo.

"Van-sama thinks about you a lot, you know."

Hitomi touched the jewel that hung from her neck. _He probably hasn't taken off the pendant ever since I gave it to him_. "I know."

Merle led her to a room halfway down the corridor, which was situated on the side of the palace that was opposite to the royal apartments, where they had started out.

Once they were inside, Merle confronted her. "So. When were you planning to tell him?"

"I…well…" She thought of how Van smelled when they kissed—earthy, like the wind blowing through the fields. Of his boyish smile, a rare sight during the war, when she brought up the pendant.She thought of Yutaro's laughter, which never failed to soothe her spirits, of the plans for the future they had only just begun to put into motion—their wedding in the garden, the house in Nerima, the names of their children who had yet to be born. "I don't know," she said finally.

Merle's back stiffened. "You don't know?" she said, nearly hissing. Her pupils were slits, dangerously narrow, and every hair on her body bristled. She bore down on Hitomi, who was forced to backpedal. "You don't _know_?"

"Merle, it's more complicated than you thi—"

"There's nothing complicated about it. The way I see it, there's only one thing to do: you have to tell Van-sama. And I'm not going to do it for you, so you can get that idea out of your head. You have to tell him yourself. Because," and here, she lowered her eyelids smugly and gave her tail a languorous _swish_, "there's something he has to tell _you_."

_Something…he has to tell me?_ Hitomi felt her heart miss a beat. _What…what does she mean?_

Merle folded her arms across her chest. "In the cabinet by the window are some extra sheets and pillows, and to get to the bathroom, make a left and it'll be at the end of the hall," she rattled off curtly. "If you need anything, you can ring a maid using the pulley next to the cabinet. Please enjoy your stay." Before leaving, she looked at Hitomi over her shoulder. "And don't make me say it again. Stay away from Van-sama." She stalked out of the room, tail held high, and slammed the door behind her.

Hitomi sat down on the bed and put her head in her hands. _Why is this happening? Why am I here?_ The pendant, dangling from her neck, bounced against the inside of her forearm. Sniffling, she wiped her eyes and bent her head to take it off, but not without remembering how Van had gently placed it around her neck. She let the chain fall in her palm in a delicate pool of gold, with the jewel lying at the edge like a rosy dewdrop.

She closed her hand over the pendant and pressed it to her forehead. _Van…I don't want you to suffer… _

It was in that moment that Kanzaki Hitomi had her first vision in five years.

-

"So you're telling me that as Fanelia was falling, there were no enemy soldiers. Not a single one."

The meeting room was a plain one, as stark and utilitarian of a room as Van had ever seen. The walls were naked, unpolished blocks of stone, lined with wooden posts that stretched upward and met at the center of the ceiling in a series of arches. Windows carved high in the walls allowed the passage of sunlight into the room, and whatever nature could not provide was supplemented by a low-hanging metal chandelier, no more than an iron circlet bearing a set of twelve candles, their wicks fueled by small pools of oil stored at their bases. The only decoration that the room had were maps and diagrams that hung nailed to the posts, heavily creased and ink-stained from countless mornings and nights of deliberation and planning. A long, heavy oak table stood in the middle of the room, flanked by equally heavy chairs whose cushioned seats were lined with velvet of deep maroon, the only luxury that was afforded in the midst of unrelieved functionality.

"That's right, my Lord," replied a man with wide shoulders and long, chestnut hair, nodding to the head of the table where Van was seated. "As buildings and houses were falling around us, we tried to predict the enemy's location, where they would strike next. But our blades swung at nothing but air."

A thin, reedy man with a straggly goatee folded his arms in his robes. "With all due respect, General Sabin, buildings made of brick and stone cannot be damaged without a cause. The enemy must have used projectiles of some sort, like the metal claws the Zaibach soldiers used in the Great War."

"I'm telling you, Doradeen, there was nothing of the kind. If the enemy were attacking with projectiles, we would have seen something—an arrow, a metal claw, a flaming ball of pitch. Our troops would have been attacked, too, or at the very least we would have gotten in the way. But there was nothing. It was as if the city was crumbling by itself."

There it was again; the same puzzling observation that General Maltek had made earlier. They made it sound as if Fanelia had a mind of its own, and was deciding to give up. _But that's silly_, Van thought. _Cities can't think._

Councilor Doradeen, who Van had selected as one of his military tacticians for his level-headed reasoning, continued relentlessly. "Then the enemy must have a powerful sorcerer on their side. There's no other explanation."

"But even if that were true, that doesn't explain why our men were not attacked," Maltek, who sat opposite from Sabin, pointed out. "There's no point in attacking a city if you're not going to weaken its military force. That's basic military strategy."

But Doradeen was not to be dissuaded. "Unless," he said, holding up a bony finger, "the enemy had a completely different aim. For example, if they wanted to inflict damage upon the city and its citizens, thus weakening morale. Or if they wanted to confuse us, distract us in order to strike when we least suspect it. Both of which they are succeeding quite well at, I might add."

"All right," Van said, and lifted a hand to forestall any further discussion. "We have a possible motive and aim, but no identification of the enemy forces. Councilor Doradeen mentioned the possibility of a sorcerer. How likely is that, Garva?"

All eyes turned to Van's head of intelligence. A rock of a man with a square jaw and large hands, Garva looked like he belonged behind a plowshare instead of in a position requiring secrecy and cunning. But his appearance was probably one of his greatest strengths; ambassadors and diplomats of other countries were less likely to take him seriously, and Garva used their underestimation of him to his advantage. "The only known sorcerers on Gaea were employed by Emperor Dornkirk during the Great War. They dispersed after the war was over, and it is rumored that they are either dead or in hiding. It's possible that one or more of them has joined forces with another nation, since there have been many changes in the offices of several foreign governments. But we're only a few years out of the war, and people are more focused on rebuilding and restoration. Besides, the military forces on all sides have been so diminished that even if someone were able to launch a successful attack, there's no way they could hope to wage an all-out war."

"But what if they don't rely on their military power?" The sixth person in the room spoke up for the first time.

A wave of incredulous murmurs arose from the other men at the table. "What do you mean, Wellyn?" Van asked, his interest aroused, and the murmuring died away.

Councilor Wellyn was only a few years older than Van and lacked the gruffness and cynicism of the other men in the room. While reason and practicality abounded with Doradeen, imagination and invention were Wellyn's sphere of influence. The head of Technological Research and Development was a dreamer, but also a genius and a visionary, which was the reason why Van always included him in their tactical discussions. There was no question that the other men at the table were far more experienced, but Wellyn brought a new perspective, a different angle, to the table that Van found refreshing and, more often than not, highly useful.

"As everyone here knows, nations rule their subjects and keep the peace not by force, but by the suggestion of order and by the imposition of consequences for breaking the law," Wellyn said. "A warring nation can subjugate another nation as long as it can intimidate the government with its military power. Which is exactly what Zaibach did, but with one important difference.

"Zaibach burned Fanelia to the ground and destroyed several other cities in Asturia in a similar fashion," he continued. "But if you will remember, they accomplished all of that with fewer than a dozen Guymelefs."

"But Councilor Wellyn," Sabin protested, "you forget that they were using cloaking devices. As long as they remained invisible to our eyes, we were powerless to stop them."

"My point exactly. Their military might arise not from numbers, but from their technology. We could not hope to defeat them unless we could come up with a counter measure. Which, in the end, we did. Using the power of Atlantis."

Van knew that Wellyn was talking about him, the boy-king who could see what could not be seen, even if he did not say as much. Everyone else at the table knew it, too. "So what are you proposing, Councilor?" he inquired, even though he was beginning to dread where the young inventor's reasoning was taking them.

"What I'm saying is that obvious military might is not necessary for waging a successful war. If one person on Gaea is able to harness the power of Atlantis, why not more than one? What if there is someone out there who is able to fell a city from afar by merely wishing it so? If there is no one else to fight such a nemesis, Gaea is theirs for the taking."

Doradeen scowled. "Don't be preposterous. No such force exists. The Zaibach machine that was built to control fate was destroyed years ago. The allied nations made sure that every bolt and screw was scrapped or incinerated. There is no one alive who possesses this power you speak of, which died long ago with Atlantis." Even as he countered Wellyn's argument, it was clear from Doradeen's wry expression that he reserved no little skepticism for mysterious, otherworldly powers, not to mention machines that magically controlled the future.

Maltek _harrumphed_, a rumble coming from deep within his throat, and crossed his arms. "Councilor Wellyn may have a point, Doradeen." He cast a shrewd eye on the king of Fanelia. "Didn't the Lady Hitomi from the Mystic Moon also have the power of Atlantis? Didn't she arrive on Gaea in a flash of light from the sky?"

Van had not told anyone about Hitomi's return, but Maltek had seen them together, as well as the beam of light. Maltek would have to be blind not to see what was in front of him. There was no hiding it now. He looked Maltek fully in the eyes. "Yes. She could see visions of the future, and she could see what we could not. Without her, we would not have been able to win the war and Gaea would have been destroyed. When the war was over, she returned to her home on the Mystic Moon." He steeled himself and looked around the table at his men. "And today, while we were being attacked, she arrived on Gaea in a beam of light."

Silence, heavy as a stone brick, dropped onto the table. Then, there erupted a sudden flurry of voices.

"Ah, Van-sama, so is it true that her love for you saved Gaea?"

"How fortunate for us, that she should appear at a time like this."

"She can assist us—"

"—why didn't you tell us before, Van-sama?"

"I find it very convenient, to be honest."

"If we have her on our side, we can withstand any enemy!"

"Practicality, Wellyn. Practicality should always—"

"We must keep her presence hidden. No doubt someone will try to—"

"We must ask her for her counsel at once!"

"—wonder if she's connected at all—"

"Are you sure it was her, Maltek?"

"—wonder where she is? Van-sama, you sly fellow, don't tell me you—"

"—to the source of the attack?"

"I tell you, I saw her with my own eyes—"

Van had been afraid that something like this was going to happen. After the war (and even during), Hitomi had become something of a legend. The girl from the Mystic Moon who could predict the future. The girl who possessed such power that she could freeze a Zaibach soldier in his steps simply by looking at him. The girl who slew Emperor Dornkirk using his own destiny-determining machine. The girl who could control the waves of the sea with a single thought.

"Everyone, everyone, settle down," Van said, vainly trying to raise his voice above the hubbub. To his surprise, they immediately fell silent. But they were not looking at him. He followed their gaze to the doorway, where Hitomi stood, clutching the frame, trying to catch her breath. "Van…the city…walls…"

An irate palace maid ran up behind her and curtsied hastily. "Van-sama, please forgive the intrusion. The foreigner girl ran through the palace screaming something about the city falling and said she needed to see you urgently. I tried to stop her, but she was too fast for me."

Hitomi dropped to her knees, and Van leaped from his chair to catch her before she fell to the ground. "Hitomi, what did you see?"

She lifted her face, and her eyes were glazed with tears. "The city walls…they're going to fall."

There was a collective murmur from the table.

"And the land dragons…Fanelia will be overrun with land dragons. There are soldiers still out there, Van! You need to call them back! They'll die if you don't!"

"Our men are more than equipped to handle land dragons, girl," Sabin said reassuringly.

"Not these," she said. "There are too many. They're coming in packs. And they're hungry. They're going to attack everyone they see."

Garva pushed his chair away from the table to get a better look at Hitomi. "Did you see who attacked the city wall?"

"No, I didn't."

"What about the land dragons? Is someone controlling them? Leading them on, perhaps?"

"I didn't see anything."

"Did you see anything else? A crest, a flag? Weapons of any sort?"

Hitomi held a balled-up fist to her mouth and could only shake her head silently.

Van gave the head of intelligence a significant look. "Garva. Not now, please." He rose and addressed the two generals. "Sabin, Maltek, I need you to call back the troops stationed in the city right away."

"But Van-sama, the enemy—"

"There is no enemy. We need to recall our men, or we'll lose them to the dragons."

"As you say, Your Highness," Sabin replied. The two men bowed and lumbered out of the room.

Not long after the generals left, there was a deafening roar, like the sound of a massive landslide. Everyone rushed out of the room, and from the large windows in the hall, they saw a cloud of dust rising from the borders of the city. Hitomi watched in horror as the flags which flew high above the city walls toppled like they were made from matchsticks, exactly as her vision predicted. The setting sun made it seem as if the city were set ablaze, even though there was no fire. The air rang with the snarls and howls of dragons, which poured out of the forest in a flood of tawny scales and claws. The sky was filled with the flapping of many wings—messenger pigeons, relaying the generals' orders to their troops. But they would not get there fast enough; the cries of the dragons were soon joined by the shouts of soldiers fighting for their lives.

Hitomi thought of Ardonis, a boy barely old enough to shave, whose armor was several sizes too large for him. He was probably out there, and he was going to die. _No,_ she thought, clutching her head. _No, this can't be happening!_

"Hitomi?" The last thing she saw, before blacking out, was Van's worried face, wavering and blending with blood-red sky.

-

When Hitomi awoke, she was lying on a couch with a damp towel on her forehead. Van was sitting by her head, wringing another towel over a small tub of water on his lap. The room was dimly lit by a muted fire in the fireplace, a dying flame on a bed of embers. It seemed that she was back in Van's sitting room. Merle was perched on a chair opposite to her, catlike, watching them.

"Ah, you're awake," Van said as she removed the towel from her forehead.

Remembering the land dragons, she quickly sat up in alarm. Her head began to feel woozy, and she groped the back of the couch for support.

"Don't sit up so fast," Van said, steadying her with one hand. "You're going to make yourself pass out again."

"The soldiers. What happened to the soldiers?" Her head throbbed. All she could hear was the alarmed cries of the soldiers echoing in her mind.

"Most of them made it back to the palace safely, thanks to you. We lost the ones who held the dragons at bay while the rest of them retreated."

Her arms, trembling like wet noodles with relief, buckled under her and she would have collapsed, were it not for Van holding her up. "And the dragons? Won't they come up to the palace?"

"They shouldn't be able to. We've closed the inner city gates. Besides, we're on top of a plateau, and the stairs are too narrow and steep for them to climb. The townspeople have taken refuge in the caves. There's an underground stream, so they will have water. There should be enough food stored away to feed them for at least a week. In the meantime, I've alerted Asturia about our situation."

"Van…I'm so sorry…"

"There's nothing to be sorry about. You saved us, Hitomi."

"But…Fanelia…you worked so hard to restore Fanelia…"

"The city is just a city. As long as Fanelia's people are safe, we'll be all right."

Hitomi blinked and dashed the tears from her eyes. Even though he didn't look much different, Van had changed in the last few years as well. He seemed…older. Much less hot-headed than the boy she had known back then. Perhaps it came with being a ruler of a country, or maybe it was the influence of his more seasoned advisors.

But if he could be strong, then so could she. Straightening, she said, "Van, whatever is happening here, let me help."

"Are you sure?"

"I'm sure. I must have been called back for a reason."

He smiled, the second time she had seen him smile that day. It was a beautiful thing to see; it transformed him completely. She suspected that other people rarely saw this side of him. "When you're here, Hitomi," he said, taking her hand, "I feel like anything is possible."

His sentiment was so unexpected that she did not know how to respond. Five years ago, it would have made her girlish heart flutter. But now…

Her eyes strayed to their hands. Thank goodness she had taken off her ring earlier, for he had grabbed her left hand. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw a flash of red coming toward her, and something landed in her lap.

"My purse!" she exclaimed, and turned an accusing look on Merle, who had thrown it.

"You dropped it when you were running," the cat replied, and stretched lazily.

"Thank you, Merle. I—"

"Oh yeah, you dropped this, too." Merle tossed something at Hitomi that sparkled in the light of the fireplace as it arced across the room.

Hitomi caught it with both hands, and when she saw what it was, her stomach sank. Cradled in her hands was a band of gold whose two ends, instead of meeting in a complete circle, were slightly offset and overlapped, the space between them bridged by a diamond flanked by two smaller ones. She looked back at Merle, who gazed back placidly with an expression as immobile as stone.

"What's that?" Van asked curiously.

How did the saying go? Curiosity killed the cat. Or the curious cat killed…

Trapped between Merle's knowing stare and Van's innocent question, Hitomi could avoid it no longer. "Van, there's something I've been meaning to tell you." She took a deep breath and slipped the ring onto the fourth finger of her left hand. The diamonds winked like three crystal eyes, mocking her for her indecision, her hypocrisy. "I'm engaged, Van. I'm engaged to someone else."


	5. Broken Bonds

Author's edit 6/13/06: I kept the beginning, but the rest of the chapter is almost completely different…but better. Much, much better :)

-

**The Last Night of the World**

**Chapter 4**

**Broken Bonds**

-

The silence in the room was so rigid, Hitomi was afraid to breathe for fear it would crack. Her hands, which had grown cold from sweat, felt as if they should be shaking uncontrollably, but they lay still. Time seemed to freeze. Nothing moved, except for the languishing fire, which broke the spell with a nerve-shattering _pop_.

"I see." The two short syllables were like icy spikes in Hitomi's chest. The cushions shifted as Van stood up. Hitomi finally raised her head and saw that he was staring down at the carpet. His strong shoulders seemed to wilt, and the hair fell over his eyes. He still carried the tub of water in his hands, which he carefully placed on the floor. The towel was draped over the side, halfway out and halfway in the water. He absently wiped his hands on his pants, accidentally jostling the sword he wore at his hip. Haltingly, he took a few steps forward, then stopped. The fireplace seemed to draw his attention, and he walked toward it as if hypnotized.

He stopped just next to Merle's chair, his back turned to both of them. Merle twisted around so she could see his face, her eyes intent and concerned. Van slowly lifted a hand and let it fall onto the back of the chair. For a moment, he said nothing, a moment that seemed to stretch on forever. When he did speak, his voice was leaden, as if something had stamped out the emotion that should have been there. "I have to tell you something, too. I'm getting married."

Hearing the word _married_ knocked the wind out of Hitomi. _This has to be some kind of joke. He can't be serious_.

But he was. "I don't know when, or to whom, but I'm getting married. Probably to the daughter of a king or a duke, I don't know. It doesn't really matter. Fanelia needs an heir, because I won't be around forever."

Hitomi twisted her hands together in her lap and stared at them. The ring gleamed coldly in the firelight. _It's not a joke_, she realized._ If I have this ring, who says he can't get married to someone else, too? _There was a creak, the sound of the door opening. She looked up, but all she saw was the tuft of fur on the end of Merle's tail as it slipped away, the door swinging shut behind her.

Now that she was all alone, the feeling that she had clamped shut in her throat fought its way free and welled up, tearing through her vocal cords and leaking through her eyes, hot tears streaming down her face.

-

Van strode down the hall with Merle trailing anxiously in his wake. The hallways were sparsely populated this late at night, but the servants he did pass bowed and greeted him ("Good evening, Your Majesty," or simply, "Your Highness") as he breezed by. He did not see or hear them; they were part of a world that, for the moment, did not exist.

He reached the palace courtyard, with its fountain of cherubs and angels and walkways that crossed a meticulously trimmed lawn. He stopped in the middle of a patch of green and drew his sword. Facing off with an invisible opponent, he lifted his left leg until the toe of his boot just touched the ground, balancing himself just so, and raised his right arm, poised to strike. What followed was not a series of premeditated sword forms or graceful, shadowy swordplay, but the furious movements of a desperate man. His blade arced and flashed wildly in the moonlight, his breath bursting through his throat in growls that punctuated every thrust, every swipe. Balgus would have reprimanded him for such inefficient use of energy, but the thought barely scratched the surface of Van's consciousness. There was only the air, his enemy, that briefly caught the edge of his blade before escaping with the wind, taunting him every time. There was only the icy fire that raged inside of him, which, if he paused even the slightest in his struggle, threatened to leave him cold and trembling.

At last, when he could lift his arms no more, when his voice had died to a hoarse cry, he fell to his knees, his sword impaling the ground in front of him. He hung from its hilt, as if to keep from drowning. His chest heaved, and his breath came in gulps. When his pulse slowed and the sweat no longer trickled down his face, he stood up. He yanked the sword free and sheathed it at his waist. Merle was sitting at the edge of the fountain, hugging her legs to her chest, her feline eyes glowing yellow pinpoints in the darkness.

"Van-sama," she mewed quietly as he walked by.

She did not follow Van back into the palace, for which he was grateful. Despite her ever-constant presence, she usually knew when to leave him alone.

The night echoed with the plaintive, eerie howling of the dragons in the city below.

-

In the royal chambers, Van lay on his bed, staring at the dark underbelly of the canopy, an arm tucked behind his head. He had crawled into bed fully dressed; Merle would have his hide if she found out he was sleeping with his boots on. His body wanted to drift off to sleep, but his mind refused to let him. First Fanelia, and now Hitomi. This morning, his kingdom had been prospering and whole, and this afternoon, he had still believed in Hitomi. Now he didn't know what was happening to his country and he didn't know what to believe.

It ate at his pride to ask Asturia for help. He had wanted to wait it out, to drive the dragons back, but the urging of his councilmen made him reconsider. The two attacks today were the strangest events Fanelia had ever seen. Nobody knew what was going on. It would be best to move the citizens to safety while Van investigated the situation further. Even if he were to drive out the dragons, the supplies in the hills would run out in the time it would take to rebuild the city walls that kept the reptiles out.

So in the end, Van wrote the necessary letters, and when the volley of messenger pigeons scattered eastward to Palas, he felt as empty as the sky that bore the birds across the heavens. The invisible Zaibach melefs had been enemies he could fight, even when he couldn't see them. And when he could see them, they became targets for his rage, his vengeance. Once again, he was being faced with an invisible enemy, but this time, it was not an enemy he could see or touch. If there was an enemy at all.

This was not the first time that Van had felt lost, but it was the first time he was adrift without an anchor. He had been too young to understand when his father died, and his memories of Goau Fanel were little more than the blurry impressions of a face and the muffled baritones of someone's voice. His mother and brother were the only family he had known, and when his mother disappeared into the dragons' forest searching for Folken, Balgus was all he had left. Merle, too, because she kept him from forgetting who he was. But Balgus had died, and Merle was a part of him that he had to keep alive, or they would both perish. And then Hitomi appeared.

_Hitomi_. With her, Van had been able to see things for what they were: the invisible Guymelefs, the future, his true affections. Having her around had made so many things become clear; she was the rainwater running down his bloodstained hands. Now, she had come to him again in Fanelia's hour of need, but with her came another invisible enemy. It was insidious, striking at his most vulnerable moment. He believed the words it whispered in his ear, and he eagerly played the fool until he discovered they were lies. But it was an enemy that he could not touch, any more than he could touch the Mystic Moon in the night sky.

The Mystic Moon shone through the window, blue and swirling, lurking at the edge of his vision. He grabbed his pillow and rolled onto his side, away from the window, covering his head. Van wondered what his name was. Whoever he was, he could have her.

_I don't need her. _Van thought of Hitomi's eyes, bright and clear as emeralds, of the look on her face when she saw only him. He screwed his eyes shut. _She doesn't need me, and I don't need her._ Then the memory of a man with long hair kissing Hitomi on a bridge surfaced to mind, unbidden. _"I asked her to marry me,"_ the man had said. Van had been afraid he had lost her then. But he should have known, from the day she first arrived on Gaea, that she had never been his to lose. It was like saying that the moon belonged to him alone and shaking his fist at the sun when day came to claim the night.

He turned restlessly under the covers, and something crinkled in his pants pocket. He reached down and withdrew a piece of paper. It was the message from the Basram diplomats that Merle had delivered to him. It outlined the details of his meeting with the Princess Renau, which was set for sometime in the next month. He had forgotten all about it.

In post-war Gaea, political relations were tentative and fragile. Governments picked their words carefully and danced around each other, afraid to crush the proverbial eggshells beneath their feet. None of the tension overtly boiled over, though there had been the occasional skirmish between bands of rogue countrymen at the borders. Van's council had been invaluable in playing the game of politics, instructing him how to hide his impatience while keeping a straight face, advising him when to hold his ground and when to let others believe that he was giving in to their wishes.

Marriage was also something they had advised. A union with a princess or noblewoman of another country would strengthen the ties between them and Fanelia and would add stability to the political atmosphere. It was a matter of business; for someone in his position, marriage was business first, pleasure second.

Over the last year, his councilmen, like worried fathers, had expressed a steady stream of concern for Van's unmarried state. Particularly because he was the last of the royal blood of Fanelia, without any brothers or cousins to produce another heir, if he were to die or to grow old alone. When he could not take their persistent encouragement anymore, he began to send missives to the neighboring allied nations in search of a bride. It was a half-hearted search, more to appease his older colleagues and to bolster the confidence of his people.

The paper in his hand was folded in three, and Van ran his thumb over the ridges of the crest that was molded into the seal. Princess Renau was not the one he was going to marry—not yet, anyway. There had also been meetings with the princesses and the daughters of noblemen from Cesario, Daedalus, and Egzardia. None of them had the same spark or openness that he knew in Hitomi. But there was no use in comparing them to her. He needed to get married because his duty was to the House de Fanel and his country. He was the king of Fanelia, and kings could not afford to spend their lives chasing after fruitless dreams.

But when sleep finally took him, he dreamed of a place far away from Gaea and the Mystic Moon, of a girl with wings who had Hitomi's face.

-

Hitomi sat beside her bed, her cheek flattened against the mattress and her legs splayed bonelessly beneath her, froglike. That she was able to find her way back was a miracle in itself; she had not been able to see anything for her tears, and it was not until one of the maids found her, confused and out of her mind, that she was gently coaxed back to her room.

This was probably what the premonition she felt in Tokyo was warning her against. Her unforeseen return to Gaea; a dangerous force at large; Van. Tokyo had felt like weeks ago, ages ago, when she saw the china in the window, the one with the feather on it. And then she ran. What a stupid thing to do. She should have known that running would land her back here.

She would not deny that she had often wished to come back. In the months after she returned back home, she dreamed about Van. She imagined she could see him watching her through a crowd, from a window. She finished her remaining year in high school and went to college. Life was vibrant and changing, and she was going to be left behind unless she dove in and let it carry her along. The seasons changed, and her visions of Van became less and less frequent, until one day, she realized that she could no longer remember the last time she saw his face.

Then she met van Himmel Yutaro. Or, Yutaro van Himmel, in the Western style of names. He was half-German and liked his soba noodles cold, with oyster sauce and a light sprinkling of cilantro.

It was April of her second year in college, right after spring break, and she was in the dining hall chowing on a bowl of soumen in beef stew. She was by herself, her friends having been called away by the need to cram for a test or run errands or some other excuse.

The empty seat facing her stared at her while she ate, and she tried to imagine what it would be like if Van were sitting there with her. It was a rare moment that she had to herself, since she lived with a roommate and was constantly surrounded by friends and classmates. She tried to think of how he might look. He might sit with his arm draped over the back of the chair, or with his hands folded on the table in front of him, his manner quiet and self-contained. It had been almost three years now, and the memory of his face, serious and half-hidden by untamed hair, was beginning to fade a little. How was Fanelia doing? Was it the beautiful, thriving country she remembered from her first visit there? Was Van happy?

"Excuse me, is this seat taken?" a voice said, interrupting her thoughts.

Hitomi looked up, and a boy with a foreign-looking nose was standing across the table from her. "No, it's not. Go ahead."

"All right. Thanks a lot." He sat down, and Hitomi noticed the plate in front of him as he picked out two chopsticks from the aluminum can at the end of the table.

"Is that soba?"

"Yeah."

"I've never seen anyone eat it like _that_ before."

"That's what people always tell me. But I like it this way. You should really try it sometime. It tastes great in hot weather."

"Thanks, but no thanks. I'll stick to what I've got."

"Sticking to what you've got isn't going to help you much, you know."

"What do you mean?" she said, slightly offended.

The boy nodded at the stack of books by her elbow. _Principles of General Chemistry. Utilitarianism: An Essay. Art of the Ages: The Renaissance. _"The greatest scientists of this century made their discoveries through strokes of luck or flashes of inspiration. Philosophers pondered the meaning of life before they came up with ideas that the rest of the world decided to follow. And I don't think I have to tell you that Picasso didn't paint his masterpieces by following the traditional rules of how to paint people's faces."

"Oh, those are just my required classes," Hitomi laughed.

He arched a sandy brown eyebrow. "Even the art class?"

"Well…there was a little bit of choice there."

He extended a hand. "Van Himmel Yutaro. Or, like they say in the West, Yutaro van Himmel." Before she could comment, he said, "It's German. I get it from my father."

She grasped his hand and shook it. "Nice to meet you, Yutaro. I'm Kanzaki Hitomi."

As they talked, she found out that they were in the same year, and that he lived in the dorm down the hill from her. That he had almost taken the philosophy class last semester, and she told him that it was a good idea that he didn't, because the lectures were so unbearably dry. That he was an aspiring writer, hoping to land a syndicated column after he graduated, and one day write novels.

The only similarity that existed was with the names, and even that was a stretch. Van Himmel Yutaro, Van Fanel. In addition, Yutaro was nothing like Van. For one, Yutaro had light brown hair that shone the color of wheat in the sun. His manner was easygoing and carefree, and he always had a quick word on his lips for anything she might have to say. When she was around him, he made her feel like she could make her dreams come true. Nothing was too hard. She only had to try, and believe. And after a while, in spite of herself, she began to fall for him.

When they kissed for the first time, Hitomi felt a pang of guilt. The second time, it faded by a shade. The next time, and the time after that, and the time after _that_, it dissolved even more, until it was no more than a ghost that occasionally drifted through her dreams.

Once, as Yutaro was kissing the side of her neck, she whispered, "Van."

"Hm?" he said, as he moved up to her jaw. "You've never called me that before."

Mortified, Hitomi turned her head away, pretending to give him easier access, so that he wouldn't see her blush. "I was just trying it out. You know."

He only chuckled and, just like that, accepted her excuse.

Ever since that day, Hitomi made every conscious effort to push Van out of her mind when she was around Yutaro, but it was much more difficult than she had thought it would be. Watch a kettle boil, and it won't boil. Force yourself to fall asleep, and you won't sleep. In trying to make herself forget Van, she thought about him all the more.

_I'm never going to see Van again_, she had thought then. _I love him, but I can't keep trapping myself in the past. I've got to keep going. And maybe one day, when I'm old, I'll tell my grandkids about the boy with the dragon who lived on a planet called Gaea. _

The story she had planned on telling her grandchildren had a happy ending. But now, she wasn't so sure.


	6. The Valley of Dragons

**The Last Night of the World**

**Chapter 5**

**The Valley of Dragons**

-

The next day, Van sat at the desk in his office, riffling through papers that lay in a pile in front of him. Several were reports of the conditions of the shelter in the hills, a partial inventory of the supplies, the details of last month's harvest. A military assessment on yesterday's attack and a summary of their meeting compiled by Doradeen. A few documents required his perusal and signature, such as the one from a jeweler's guild asking for permission to start mining in the hills. _They won't be doing any mining anytime soon,_ he thought, and laid it aside.

As he worked, the folded-up message from Basram kept hovering at the edge of his vision. He had placed it apart from the rest of his papers, since it was a meeting waiting to happen and didn't need his immediate attention. But he kept it just in sight as a thorny reminder of how matters stood between him and Hitomi.

As the sun climbed higher into the sky, the words on the paper in front of him began to run together. Van rubbed his eyes, which were scratchy and dry. He hardly slept at all last night; he felt like a dishrag that had been wrung dry to the bone. Everyone was depending on him to hold the kingdom together. He had to find a way to hold himself together first.

There was a knock on the door. Probably a messenger to relay Asturia's reply to his requests for help. It would not exactly make him feel better, but at least it would not make him feel worse.

"Come in," he said.

The person who entered, however, was not a messenger, but the last person he expected to see. Van's hand froze in mid-sentence, the quill suspended in the air. Hitomi let the door close and stood uncertainly, fidgeting with her ring. Their eyes met, and they both quickly looked away as if burned.

"What are you doing here?" Van asked gruffly.

"I…I said I would help."

"You don't have to."

"I want to help, Van."

"Fine. But why did you come here?"

"I thought…" She trailed off.

…_that there might be something to talk about?_ Van stole a glance at her. Dark shadows made her eyes appear sunken, and a delicate vein traced the translucent skin of her temple. She had not slept well either, an observation he noted with a mixture of satisfaction and regret.

Reaching for the doorknob, Hitomi said, "I'd better go, then."

"There's been no change since yesterday," he said as she turned the knob. "We're still waiting for Asturia to get back to us. Otherwise, we're holding up."

When their eyes met again, her expression was one of gratitude, but Van focused on keeping his neutral. He reached down and dug something out of his pocket. "Here," he said, the chain of the pendant dangling from his fingertips. "You're probably going to need this."

"Thank you," she said as he let it drop into her palm.

"Don't go too far," he said before he could stop himself, and surprise dawned on her features. "In case you see anything," he added quickly.

When Hitomi left, Van tried to lose himself in the spaces between the lines formed by letters neatly stacked together, the dips of the downstrokes and the turns of the ink as it abruptly changed direction, a maze of black and white, of words and meaning. He tried to block the image of Hitomi from his mind: the way her braids were matted as if she had slept in them, the way she moved her mouth when she spoke, the graceful arch of her fingers when she took the pendant from him. The Basram letter watched him from the edge of the desk, its red wax seal like a bloodshot eye, an open sore. Snatching it from the polished wood surface, Van opened a drawer, shoved the letter inside, and slammed it shut.

-

Outside, at an intersection in the hallway, Hitomi slowed to a halt by a statue of a knight whose hands rested on the pommel of a massive sword balanced in front of him. She uncurled her fingers, which had been tightly closed around the pendant. Picking up the jewel between her forefinger and thumb, she let the chain dangle between the fingers of her other hand like a small golden waterfall. It was warm, after having been nestled against Van's leg in his pocket, but it quickly became cool as droplets of water in the morning air. She had forgotten all about the pendant until now. The last thing she remembered about it was taking it off right before she had the vision. After that, her world had become such a whirlwind that she no longer knew which way was up.

Slinging the chain across both hands, between her thumbs, she looped it over her head. She pulled her braids through, one by one, stray strands of hair momentarily snagging the chain links. She studied the statue in front of her: it had blind stone eyes and a sharp jaw that thrust forward very much like Van's did. This was probably an ancestor, she realized, a relic of the old Fanelia that had somehow managed to survive the Great War. It was something that felt unexpectedly, oddly familiar in a world that had, in such a short period of time, become so distant and unfamiliar.

-

The days passed, and messenger pigeons streaked through the sky. Asturia agreed to give the people of Fanelia temporary refuge, as did the allied duchy of Freid. Other than struggling with the fine details of the logistics of the evacuation, the rest of the week was blessedly uneventful. Van wondered what Hitomi did with her time or if she listened to him when he asked her to stay close by. Part of him wanted to ask, but the other part of him said that he already had too many answers that he didn't want to know, and he didn't need any more.

Leviships came to haul away refugees by the boatload, an operation that was being overseen by his two generals and Doradeen. Although Fanelia was a small country, transplanting tens of thousands of people with a limited number of ships took several days. Van stopped by periodically to receive report and assess their progress. It probably would have been more efficient to communicate with his overseers by pigeon or by meeting with them at the end of the day, but Van preferred to see for himself. Also, viewing the ruined city from the trail that hugged the wall of mountains surrounding Fanelia served as a constant reminder of the burden he shouldered as Fanelia's ruler and protector.

One day, as Van was mediating an argument between Doradeen and an Asturian official about the reliability of his crew members, a leviship that Van immediately recognized descended in the clearing by the yawning cave mouths. It was the _Crusade_, its sleek hull sandwiched between two giant stones as black as charcoal, the leviship that belonged to a certain blond-haired knight.

The grass fanned out in the ship's descent, and the wind tugged Van's hair away from his face. The rear of the ship swung down to meet the ground, and a tall man with long, yellow hair paraded out, followed by several of his men.

"Fancy meeting you here, King Van!" the man exclaimed jovially, holding out his hand.

"Allen Schezar," Van said politely, shaking the older man's hand and nodding at his crew. "What brings you to Fanelia?"

"I heard about what happened," Allen said, more seriously. "I wanted to know if you needed a hand."

If Allen wanted to know if Van needed any help, he did not have to haul his leviship and band of men all the way over the mountains to Fanelia. What Allen was really meant, in the language between men, was that he wanted to know how Van was doing. He had been there when Van struggled with his demons and fought to live up to everyone else's expectations during the Great War. Back then, Allen had been a mentor of sorts and Van his grudging apprentice, even while they vied for Hitomi's affection. "Fanelia has been destroyed, and we can't pinpoint where the attack came from, or who the attackers were," Van explained. "Even worse, the dragons have come out of the forest in large numbers and are roaming the city, and we haven't been able to drive them back."

"A city besieged by dragons," Allen muttered to himself. The man had a knack for the poetic, even when he wasn't trying. "Have you gone down to investigate?"

"How can I? The dragons would tear apart any soldiers I send down there. This isn't an enemy army we're talking about, Allen. They don't know the meaning of negotiation or restraint."

"I mean with Escaflowne."

"Escaflowne?"

"Escaflowne is smaller and more agile than any leviship in existence. You could easily fly down there and take a closer look, to see how bad the situation really is."

With so many other things on his mind, he had not considered using Escaflowne in a scouting expedition. It was not a bad idea. In fact, it was brilliant. Van was about to say so when Hitomi emerged from the mouth of one of the caves. "Allen? Is that you?" she called.

It took Allen a moment, but he recognized her. "Hitomi! You really have come back!" Allen went to meet her, covering the distance between them with long strides. "The rumors were true, after all."

In the middle of the clearing, he bent on one knee and gallantly kissed the back of her hand. When he rose, Hitomi asked, "How are you doing, Allen? How is Asturia? And Princess Millerna? And Dryden? Are they doing well?" The questions poured out from her in a flood of relief that there was finally a familiar face who she could talk to without feeling completely estranged.

Allen laughed heartily and said, "They are all doing fine, more than fine. We'll have plenty of time to talk about them, I'm sure. But I see that you, on the other hand," and he took her left hand, bringing the ring into view, "are a taken woman."

"Y-Yes," she replied, silently praying that he would not ask the question she knew was coming next.

"It's not what you think." Van had come up behind Allen, his expression steely. Then, to Hitomi, he said curtly, "What are you doing here?"

The unfriendly nature of his question nettled Hitomi. "What do you think I'm doing here?" she replied. "I came to help distribute supplies and round up people for the evacuation. I said I wanted to help, so I did."

"I thought I told you to stay in the palace," he said, frowning. "You should have let me know where you were. You could have had another vision."

_He **told **me?_ _Why is he making me feel like I'm doing something wrong? Or that I'm supposed to be on some sort of leash? _"Since when do I have to report to you everything I do?"

He stared hard at her left hand, which still hung poised in the air, then crossed his arms and turned away. "That's right, I forgot. You don't."

Allen, sensing that something was definitely amiss, wisely held his peace. Hitomi whirled on her heel and stomped back to the caves, where soldiers were busy herding people into groups to be taken away by leviship. Halfway there, she turned around and yelled, "If I had a vision, I was going to tell you anyway!" Then she broke into a run, blinking away angry tears.

Hitomi did not see much of Van after that, except for occasional glimpses from afar when he made his rounds with the officers. Instead, she occupied herself with handing out food and blankets to those who needed them. She spent time playing with the children and talking to people, hearing their stories about what life was like on Gaea from regular folk. Many people had been badly injured from falling bricks and rafters, so she followed the medics around, learning how to clean wounds and change bandages and even dowsing when they could not figure out what was wrong.

At the end of the day, she went back to the palace with the other relief workers, most of whom were soldiers, medics, and nurses. She did not really want to suffer Merle's cold stares or the uncomfortable atmosphere between her and Van, so she went straight to her room. Why she was trying so hard in a world where she didn't belong was a good question; but she cared about what happened to Fanelia. She cared about what happened to Van.

As she lay on her bed, she wished that things didn't have to be like this. She wished for the days when the sight of him was enough to fill her with joy, when he made her feel like she belonged. The days when they needed each other to survive, he with Escaflowne and she with her clairvoyance, when their destinies were the two halves of a circle that blended together, unable to tell where one left off and where the other began.

Staring at the wall, at the thin line made by moonlight peeking through the shutters, Hitomi wondered if she didn't still need him even now.

-

The next morning, Councilor Doradeen conducted a headcount of the remaining refugees and predicted that after today, the evacuation would be complete. A weight left Van's shoulders after hearing the news; at least his people would be safe. As long as Fanelia had her people and her king, she would survive. The man who had once told him that sat next to him, absentmindedly tapping a leather-bound book on the table to some internal rhythm.

Allen's presence had been an unexpected boon: he helped smooth out the details of coordinating transport with the captains of the Asturian leviships, many of whom he knew personally. "If only he had shown up sooner," Doradeen, a stickler for efficiency and order, had huffed. "The process would have gone much faster."

When the last of the leviships took off with its precious cargo, Van turned to the blond knight next to him. "Allen, I am deeply indebted to Asturia, and to you. Thank you for assisting Fanelia in our time of need."

Allen waved his hand in way of saying _you're welcome_. "If anything, King Aston feels indebted to _you_. If it weren't for you and Hitomi, none of us would be here today. Speaking of which," he said, leaning closer, "something is going on between you two."

Van stared straight ahead, and his silence was answer enough for Allen.

"You weren't the one who gave her that ring." Again, it was a statement, not a question. "It was someone else. From the Mystic Moon, I imagine."

"Yeah."

"You can't just give up on her, Van."

"What would be the point? She can't stay. When all of this is over, she's going to go back home and marry him." As soon as the words left his mouth, he realized that he sounded petulant, like a whining dog on its last legs. He could feel Allen's icy blue eyes boring into him.

"The two of you destroyed the emperor's destiny-controlling machine against all odds. The strength of your love was that powerful. You used to believe in her, and she believed in you." Allen looked off to the side, where Hitomi stood talking to two other women, their heads bent together as if sharing a secret. "I've seen her working with the soldiers and the medics. She believed in you, and I think she still does."

-

When it came time for Van and his retainers to depart, Allen offered to escort them himself. Van declined, saying that he wanted to stay behind to scout the city and the surrounding forest. "I'll catch up with you later."

"Are you sure?"

"Yeah. It shouldn't take long. Asturia's less than a day from here by air."

But he had not counted on Hitomi still being around; she had not left with the other townspeople. It fell to reason that she would leave on the _Crusade_ along with the rest of his advisors, which made Van even more glad that he had not chosen to go with them. If he and Hitomi traveled together, the awkward silences between them would raise too many questions. But something about the way her face lit up when Allen first arrived at the scene bothered him. Why should he care? She was engaged to another man anyway. But the image of Allen kissing her over one of the bridges of Palas still lingered in his memory.

Hitomi was busy helping the medics pack up their instruments and supplies. The medics, along with the soldiers, were also among the last to leave since they were considered essential personnel for the evacuation. She was on her hands and knees, filling a crate with rolls of gauze and bandages. Gathering up his courage, Van walked up behind the crate and cleared his throat.

"Um…Hitomi."

"Yes?" she said coolly without looking up, pointedly focused on her task.

"I…I want you to stay with me."

Her head immediately snapped up from the length of gauze she was rolling.

_Oh no, not again_. His cheeks burned like fire as his mind conjured up the memory of humiliation and the sting of her slap the last time he said the same exact words to her. "N-Not like that. I mean…" Why was he getting flustered? It was just a scouting trip. "I mean I want you to stay _here _with me. And not leave with Allen. I'm going down to Fanelia to look around. With Escaflowne. So I'd like you to come with me, to…to…" _To what?_ "…to back me up. In case you see something I don't."

Van mentally smacked himself. He needed to stop using her power as an excuse. She probably hated him by now, if she didn't before. What was he doing, anyway?

Laying aside the gauze, Hitomi seemed to give his request careful consideration. "All right," she replied, getting to her feet and dusting off her dress. "But only if you promise me one thing."

"Ok."

"Let's try not to get mad at each other, ok?"

-

Shortly afterwards, they had taken off and were flying over the hills toward the city. Van controlled Escaflowne's flight by the means of two handles and curved levers connected by a complex system of wires to the gears that tilted the dragon armor's wings to catch an updraft or curled the tail to change their course. Behind him, Hitomi stood with her feet braced to keep her balance and her arms locked stiffly around his waist to keep from falling off. Hitomi had not taken into account _how_ they would go about doing this when she agreed to come along. It still stung, the way he had questioned her so accusingly earlier that day. Her hands were clenched into fists, as if to avoid touching him as much as she could, her body rigid like a wooden statue.

The stilted silence as they flew only served to emphasize the distance between them. When they were passing over the ramparts that guarded the palace, Van finally spoke.

"Hitomi, I'm sorry. About today." The wind whipped his words over his shoulder the way it whipped the hair back from his face.

His words were like a trigger, releasing the tension in Hitomi's arms. She unfurled her fingers and let them lay flat across his belly. "Me too, Van."

And just like that, they were five years younger again, the boy with his dragon and the girl from the Mystic Moon.

-

They zig-zagged over the broken rooftops of the city, which had been whole and bustling with life only a short week ago. Van set his mouth in a frown and gripped the handles harder, as if doing so could make him forget how beautiful his city used to look from the windows of the palace, pretending that his city was not this abandoned ruin that was now crawling with scaly reptiles who poked their large, ugly heads into the empty rooms that used to be someone's home. Once, they passed over a trio of dragons huddled around something on the ground, sniffing and grunting and dipping their heads up and down. Scattered nearby were several swords and spears, a boot connected to an armored pant leg that was stained brown with dried blood. One of the dragons spied them flying above them and it looked up, a string of flesh dangling between its knifelike teeth. Van felt Hitomi's arms tighten around him, her fingers digging into the fabric of his shirt. He banked to the left and caught a wind that brought them higher, away from the killing fields that Fanelia had become.

He had seen enough. Dragons populated almost every street where there had once been people. Driving them out would not be an easy task; land dragons were afraid of fire, but it would take a large, concerted effort to herd them back into the forest and keep them there until the city walls were rebuilt. Now the remaining question: why had they come out of the forest in the first place?

Swooping over the leafy treetops, Van did not think anything appeared amiss until a low rumble reached his ears. The rushing of the wind in his ears must have drowned it out before. He swung Escaflowne in the direction of the sound, which grew to a dull roar. _The sound of an army on the march_, he thought grimly.

Somewhere ahead, the sea of trees abruptly ended in a line that stretched across the horizon, dividing forest from clearing. _An enemy encampment_. _Just as I thought. _But how could an enemy force of this size have escaped the notice of Garva's scouts or the wolf-people who resided in Arzas?

Then it occurred to Van that the village of Arzas should be nearby. An icy hand twisted in his gut. Ruhm would have sent word if he had seen anything strange. And chopping down half a forest was definitely strange. Van strained for any sign of the village with its rounded huts that dotted the trees, but to no avail.

As he drew closer to the break in the trees, the air around him grew warmer until it was hot and dry as a desert wind. When he saw it, his heart dropped through the bottom of his stomach. "Oh my God," he heard Hitomi whisper.

In front of them, below them, where there should have been trees upon trees rising above the tangled undergrowth, was a pit—no, a ravine, a jagged wound in the ground—that hissed with a lake of molten fire, the waves bubbling and lapping at the rocky walls. The ground by the pit was parched and cracked, the vegetation charred and blackened near the lip and merely desiccated further away by the edge of the forest. The gaping hole that had swallowed up the forest floor was so vast that Van could barely see to the other side of it, where it merged with the skyline of mountains that separated Fanelia and Asturia.

No wonder the dragons had fled.


	7. River of Fire

Author's note: Ok, I finally know how this fic is going to end. Maybe I will actually be able to finish it some day ;)

A note on the characters' ages: They are never mentioned in the anime, so if you haven't noticed by now, I've taken the liberty of assigning them myself. In this fic, Van and Hitomi were 17 during the Zaibach war, making them 22 in present day. I recently found out that they were supposed to be 15 in the anime, but that seems way too young to me, so I'm sticking with the ages I came up with.

Edit: I've just made some minor corrections to geographical locations.

-

**The Last Night of the World**

**Chapter 6**

**River of Fire**

-

"Oh my God," Hitomi said again.

Van brought Escaflowne in lower, sweeping back and forth in wide arcs as close to the fiery pit as he could. The sides were steep and sheer, as if a giant blacksmith had poured out a ladleful of molten metal that burned right through the ground. It was so hot that his vision wavered and blurred, as if the air itself were melting. Try as he might, Van couldn't get in much closer, the wall of heat emanating from the liquid fire was so blistering.

"Why is there so much lava here?" he heard Hitomi ask, echoing his own thoughts. "Where did it come from?"

"It must have been an earthquake," he concluded, unable to draw his eyes away from the massive fissure blighting the landscape.

"But wouldn't we have felt the tremors?"

She had a good point. "What else could it be?"

"I don't know." Her arm came into view, reaching between his arm and chest to point at the mountain range in the distance. "Is there a volcano nearby?"

Van shook his head. There were no volcanoes, and there had never been an earthquake in the history of Fanelia, or in that region of the world for that matter. It was as if the ground had been cracked wide open and the planet itself was bleeding.

He swung them away from the pit and began to circle over the remainder of the forest. "The village of Arzas should be around here," he shouted over the wind and the roar of the lava. "Do you think you can locate it?"

"I'll try."

_Ruhm, please be safe_. The forest spread out before him in a thick carpet of leaves, the treetops poking up at different heights, knobby and uneven. He kept his eyes trained for the telltale thinning of foliage that heralded the presence of civilization, looking for the clusters of brown huts that huddled together like anthills.

"Van," Hitomi said anxiously, "I can't seem to find it."

"What? Are you sure?"

"The village where the wolf people live, right?"

"Right."

"Hang on, let me try again." Then, after a moment, "_There!_" she cried."To our left!"

He followed her finger, which indicated a patch of trees that looked exactly the same as all the rest. "Are you sure?" he asked doubtfully, but pulled up the handle on the right to fly in for a closer look.

In that moment, a hard gust blew in from the northeast, and what Van meant as a sharp turn became an even sharper roll to the left, drawing a terrified yelp from Hitomi and nearly causing him to lose his footing. With all the strength he could muster, he hauled Escaflowne's wings back in the other direction in an attempt to level out, but the dragon armor bucked in the turbulent winds. Then, as if by its own will, the dragon lowered its head and they began to descend at an alarming rate.

"Escaflowne!" Van exclaimed. He vainly tried to pull up, but they were getting too close to the trees and, from the way his left side was suddenly bathed in heat, the wind was trying to blow them back to the ravine. Leaves and branches rushed up at him, followed by tree trunks covered in rough bark, each one a great pillar that against which Van was sure they would meet their end, but ended up missing them by mere inches instead.

As Escaflowne crashed through and snapped the lower branches, Van let go of the controls, grabbed Hitomi, and catapulted away from the dragon just as it plowed into the ground. They tumbled through the undergrowth and over the roots that protruded from the forest floor, Van using his body to shield Hitomi from the impact as much as possible. When they finally rolled to a halt, he let go and lay there panting from pain and relief.

Hitomi groaned and slowly pushed herself up. She saw Van lying on his back, unmoving, and concern colored her features. "Van, are you ok?" she said, her eyebrows drawn together in worry.

"Yeah, I'm fine." He tried to sit up and winced at the sudden pain shooting through his shoulder.

"What's wrong with your arm?" she asked in alarm.

He carefully moved his right arm up and down and around in circles. The shoulder didn't appear to be dislocated, but when he drew his arm back, he winced. "I probably sprained it when we jumped off. Either that or Escaflowne took some minor damage when it landed." He twisted around to find the dragon armor, which had created a large furrow in the earth, its wings tucked close to its body. "But I'm ok."

Hitomi continued to look at him with worried eyes, as if she didn't quite believe him, but she nodded and helped him up. "That way," she said, pointing westward. "That's where they are."

"Arzas?"

"I don't know. But there's a mother and a child."

He followed her, his compass in these ravaged woods. The afternoon was deceptively peaceful. The sunlight filtering through the canopy of leaves danced across the ground as the trees swayed in the wind. Then Van noticed that it was very quiet, too quiet; there were no signs of birds calling to each other or hopping from branch to branch, no chitter of insects rubbing their wings together. There was only the rumbling like that of a distant waterfall that permeated through the trees.

They shortly came upon a bundle of gray fur and dirt-stained blue cloth huddled by the base of a towering oak. The wolf's eyes were half-open, dull yellow and glazed, and in her arms was a mewling pup. Hitomi knelt by her side and shook her gently. "Excuse me, are you all right? Can you hear me?"

The woman weakly turned her lupine head in Hitomi's direction. "My child…please help my child," she said hoarsely.

"What's your name?" Van asked, kneeling beside Hitomi. "What happened?"

Her yellow eyes opened a hair wider at the sight of Van. "Van-sama…it's me, Clara."

"_Clara?_" The wife of Ruhm, the clan leader of the wolves of Arzas, was hardly recognizable to Van in her current state. Her rust-colored mane of hair, whose rich luster had been the envy of the village, was now dull and rough, knotted in places and tangled with twigs and burrs. The spunk and liveliness he was so used to seeing had gone out of her eyes, now listless and the color of dull gold. "What in the world happened to you?"

"I was away from the village…foraging…when it happened. There was a loud rumbling…I rushed back…the ground opened up…swallowed the village…" Clara broke off coughing, her breathing labored and wheezing. Her eyes began to close, as if speaking had drained her of any remaining energy. "Everyone…gone. Arzas…is no more."

"_Arzas is no more?_" Van repeated, shocked. "How can that be?" When she didn't respond, he frantically shook her shoulder. "Clara? Clara!"

"She's running a high fever," Hitomi said, her palm on the wolf's forehead. She ran her hands over the arms, through the fur, looking for something. Then, flipping up the torn hem of Clara's blue dress, she revealed an angry-looking gash just below the knee, caked with black chunks of dried blood and dirt. The inside of the wound gleamed pale pink, the color of raw meat that had been sitting out for too long, and was dripping a filmy white fluid. "No wonder. It must be infected," she declared, gingerly touching the back of her hand to the leg. "The skin around it is burning hot. The infection must have gotten into her system."

"All right. Let's move her," Van said, but instead of moving to help him pick up the injured wolf, Hitomi went completely still. Her eyes were still fixed on Clara's terrible wound, blank and unfocused, and Van had seen her do this enough times to know when she was having a vision.

Just as suddenly as she had entered the trance, she snapped out of it with a little gasp and fell forward onto her hands, her chest heaving. "Van…it's coming…fire, a river of fire…it's coming! We have to get out of here!"

She had barely finished speaking when a loud _crack_ split through the air and the ground began to tremble beneath them. "Hitomi, you take the pup. I'll carry Clara. We need to get to Escaflowne right away!"

Van lifted Clara's limp body over his good shoulder, and Hitomi scooped up the wolf child in her arms. They took off at a sprint, Hitomi leading the way. It was no easy task, with Clara's body weighing down on him like a heavy bag of sand and the tremors making his every step uncertain. Sinewy tree roots seemed to crop up out of the ground at the most inconvenient times and the thick vines that carpeted the forest floor tripped him and tangled around his feet. _Escaflowne…come to me, Escaflowne!_ he thought desperately, a wave of heat following close on his heels.

Crashing through the underbrush, Escaflowne had never been such a welcome sight. The enormous Guymelef halted in front of them and the control chamber opened with the hiss of pressure released, a mechanical sigh. He laid Clara down by its feet and, with several great leaps, settled himself into the control chamber. Thrusting his arms into the hollow armpieces and his legs into the pedals, Van reached down and gathered up Hitomi and Clara in his giant armored hands before the cockpit even had the chance to close.

However fast Van tried to move, the delay of mobilizing Escaflowne was more than enough for the wrath of nature to catch up to them. Fissures split the ground they stood on like the intricate pattern of a spider's web, and the forest floor rapidly crumbled, falling away into the river of molten lava that carved its way through the Fanelian forest.

_I need to find the main road_, Van thought as he dodged between the trees, carefully cradled the two women in his hands. The vegetation here was so thick that he could hardly see where he was going; there was certainly no room for Escaflowne to take off. The main road was wide and well-traveled and would provide more than enough space for Escaflowne to spread its wings. _But I can't see the sun through the trees and there are no landmarks. Where is the road?_

He tried to picture it in his mind: a well-worn path tramped out by the feet of merchants and travelers over the centuries, wide enough to allow twenty men on horseback to pass. Then in his mind's eye, it popped into view, a distant strip of road somewhere ahead, beyond the trees. He made a beeline for it, making sure to shield Hitomi and Clara from the branches that snagged at their clothing and scratched at their skin. With every step he took, the ground gave way under the feet of the dragon armor before collapsing into the fiery river below, which followed them like a deadly orange tongue.

At last, the trees began to thin out and they broke out into the open, the blessed open ground and sunlight. Escaflowne immediately transformed into the dragon, and they lifted off the ground and into the air. Van brought them high, as far away from their near escape from death as possible. From the air, he saw that the river of fire veered off from the larger ravine like a tributary, consuming the forest floor that lay in its path. It cut across the road they just left and snaked through the trees on the other side, arcing across Fanelia's southern border like a moat. Fanelia was now virtually closed off to anyone trying to reach it on foot.

Give him a dozen Guymelefs, and he could defeat them all; but in the face of a natural disaster, the earth tearing at its seams, Van was at a loss. All he could do was pray that Fanelia itself would not be swallowed up in the fiery chaos below.

-

They soared through the air with the eagles, heading east for Asturia. In front of Van, Hitomi sat in the hollow of Escaflowne's back with Clara, who was curled up against the prow. The dragon armor rocked like a small canoe in choppy waters as Van navigated the winds, and had the pilot been anyone else, Hitomi would have feared falling off. Clara, who had never been on a flying Guymelef before, did not share the same sentiment. She had nervously drawn into herself and clutched her son close.

The child, however, was more skittish than his mother was. He wriggled in her arms, his green eyes rolling in terror, whimpering and fighting to free himself. "Sen, hold still," his mother scolded as sternly as she could in her weakened state.

Sen, a wolf of four years, only shook his head violently and fought even harder. "No, Momma, let me off. Let me off!"

"Sen, we can't get off until we get to somewhere safe. Be a good boy and stay with Momma."

But no amount of coaxing would calm the wolf child. With a great heave, he hoisted himself out of his mother's arms and clambered over the side, disappearing under Escaflowne's wing.

"Sen!" Clara and Hitomi cried at the same time, horrified.

"Hitomi!" Van yelled. Hitomi looked up at him, and before she could say a word, he had thrust Escaflowne's control gears into her hands and dove off the dragon after the boy.

Hitomi could only stare at her hands in shock. "Van…!" she began to say. Escaflowne went into a nosedive, and she tried to scramble to her feet. But she only partially succeeded, with one leg still tucked beneath her and the other foot jammed into one of the footholds. She pulled up on the handles as she had seen Van do so many times, but it was like trying to pull up a fifty-ton boulder. She needed more leverage. Swinging her leg around, she was able to finally free it and haul herself upright, all the while making Escaflowne sway from side to side even more violently. Clara tightly gripped the raised edges of the prow, her eyes closed and mouth moving as if muttering in prayer.

Fighting to bring Escaflowne under control was like fighting to control a beast that wanted to do everything except what Hitomi wanted it to do. They bobbed drunkenly through the air, and Hitomi was too focused on trying to reign in the dragon armor, her arms burning with effort, to think about being sick.

After what seemed like an eternity, Van reappeared by the dragon's head with the trembling Sen in his arms, gliding alongside Escaflowne. Two snow-white wings had sprouted from his back, the torn edges of his green shirt trailing behind where the wings had exited.

"Van!" Hitomi shouted in frustration and relief. "What in the world were you thinking?"

She didn't know if he heard her, because instead of answering, he dropped behind and landed somewhere on the rear of the dragon. Suddenly, a flash of gray darted between her legs, and Sen scampered into his mother's waiting arms. Tears of relief rolled down Clara's face as she cradled and cooed at her son, who was shaking with fright.

"What were you thinking, Van?" Hitomi said again, almost crying with exasperation. "You nearly killed us! I thought we were going to die!"

"Don't worry," he replied, his voice unexpectedly close, by her ear. "Hitomi, I'm going to ask you to fly Escaflowne for me."

"_Are you crazy?_"

"This way I can keep an eye on the other two, just in case. Don't worry; if you trust me, Escaflowne will listen to you."

_Don't worry, he says. _Swallowing nervously, Hitomi wondered how on earth he was going to make this happen. But she noticed that even though the wind continued to pitch them from side to side, their course was far less bumpy than it had been before. Van reached his arms around Hitomi and placed his hands on the controls over both of hers. With gentle pressure, he coached her to pull up and to the side as the wind changed direction. He showed her when to lean into a current to pick up speed and how to skirt around the crosswinds. After a while, Hitomi began to sense the patterns of the invisible currents the way Van did and to feel the dragon armor's gears moving and churning as if they were part of her own body.

"There's Palas, over there," Van pointed out as they approached the city, its many canals glittering in the late afternoon sun, a jewel nestled in the coastline of Asturia. From the streets, the capital of Asturia was a beautiful city; from the air, it was simply breathtaking.

They descended over the leviship docks and landed next to a stocky cargo ship, Escaflowne's claws skidding over the loose gravel. They lurched to a halt and Hitomi collapsed to her knees, a heap of jelly. Several hands helped Van carry Clara and Sen off the dragon and when he had made sure that they were getting the care they needed, he came back to help Hitomi.

"Can you stand?" he asked, holding out his hand.

"I can try." She grabbed his hand and tried to pull herself up, but her arm felt like a rubber band. Van stooped down, lifted her into his arms, and hopped down. Carefully lowering her legs, he let her feet touch the ground, and she half-stood with an arm around his waist and his hand behind her back.

"We did it," she said breathlessly, not quite believing her own words. "We did it, Van!" Her knees giddy with relief and trembling from the effort of flying Escaflowne, Hitomi leaned her head on Van's chest, and in spite of everything that had happened, she began to laugh. She laughed out of the joy of being alive, for doing the impossible, for simply being able to stand on solid ground. The emotion poured out of her like a torrent, and the low sound coming from Van's chest told her that he was laughing with her, too.

"What have we here? The Lady Hitomi herself, piloting the legendary Escaflowne!" A deep voice broke through their moment, and a tall, bespectacled man with flowing brown hair strode toward them with Merle and Councilor Wellyn in tow. "Who would have dreamed it was possible? I thought the dragon armor only obeyed its master."

"It will listen to someone else, if its master trusts them," Van replied. "It's good to see you, Dryden. I was not expecting to meet you here."

"Well met, King of Fanelia. I have heard about your situation. My condolences."

"It's not over yet, Dryden. As long as I'm king, Fanelia will survive."

The merchant sagely nodded in agreement. "They have a future as long as they have you." Then his eyes widened in pleasant surprise as he spotted the ring on Hitomi's hand, which was holding onto Van's shoulder. "It seems that you two have a future together as well. I have hardly seen a happier couple."

It was as if a cold shroud suddenly descended with Dryden's words. The silence that followed was expectant, and Van waited for Hitomi to reply. But when it became clear that she wasn't going to say anything, he slowly removed his arm, leaving her to stand awkwardly without assistance. "We're nothing of the sort," he said quietly. Hooking a thumb over the scabbard at his waist, he walked away, across the loading docks to the city. Merle trailed after him, but not before she threw Hitomi a dirty look.

"It seems that things are not what they appear," Dryden remarked, watching them go. "There was something I wanted to discuss with him, too, but it looks like it will have to wait."

Legs wobbling, Hitomi sank to the ground, her knees buckling under her. Wellyn hurried forward to catch her before she fell all the way down. The spell had been broken.


	8. Palas

Author's note: This chapter would not have been possible without the help of the totally awesome Sharlee :)

To recap the age issue for those who may have missed it:  
The long(er) version: See my author's note from the previous chapter.  
The short version: I am playing fast and loose with the characters' ages, since they were never mentioned in the anime. Hitomi and Van are currently 22 in this fic, and Millerna is 24.

-

**The Last Night of the World**

**Chapter 7**

**Palas**

-

_One can be a word that counts as lonely  
Two can be as lonely as each can be  
Searching and pretending  
As we wander through this world  
Can we ever know  
Where hearts go_  
_- "Perfect World" by Yoko Kanno_

-

"Why didn't she say anything?"

Merle followed her childhood friend through the streets of Palas, her padded feet stepping almost silently on the cobblestones in the company of Van's heavier footfalls. _She can never decide, that's why_, Merle thought, but kept her opinion to herself. _Typical._

"She should have said _something_," Van insisted.

Merle walked beside him without speaking; the tabby cat had known Van long enough to know when he was just talking out loud and when he was looking for a response. But it was unusual for Van—Van, who never talked about the way he felt—to be this outspoken, even around her, unless he was truly upset.

They weaved their way between the people who populated the busy merchant city. Their path would eventually take them to the royal palace, and Merle figured that Van probably needed to work off some frustration first. She imagined King Aston would be appalled when he found out that the king of Fanelia came to the palace without a royal escort, and on foot, no less.

"She should have said something," he repeated. "Yes or no, I don't care. It really doesn't matter."

_But it does matter, Van-sama. It matters to you, and it matters a lot._ That much she could tell, from the stiff way he carried his shoulders, from the agitation barely contained in his step. From the way he used to absently finger Hitomi's pendant without realizing what he was doing.

"Just let her go, Van-sama," Merle said, echoing the same advice she had given him years ago, during the Great War. "If she really loved you, she would have said something. She wouldn't be making you go through all this." She almost added, "I knew something like this was going to happen," but this was not really the time for I-told-you-sos.

In truth, it made Merle almost glad that Hitomi had proved her right. Merle knew Van better than anyone alive, and her cat's instinct was rarely wrong, even when he stubbornly refused to listen to her. But it was a Pyrrhic victory, because when she was right and he was wrong, it usually meant that he was going to suffer. And in this case, his heart was being broken by a fickle woman who was afraid of commitment.

"Do you really think she's fickle?" Van stopped so suddenly in the middle of the street that Merle almost walked right on ahead.

_Oops._ She must have been mumbling aloud without realizing it. "She can't make up her mind, Van-sama. She's fickle," Merle said bluntly.

His face fell at her remark, and Merle wondered if she was being too harsh. You shouldn't sugarcoat the truth, in her opinion, but over the years, she learned that there was something called _tact_. Though there were times when the truth was going to hurt, even with all the tact in the world.

But what was the truth? Van loved Hitomi, that was clear. And Merle was pretty sure that Hitomi still had feelings for Van. But Merle didn't want Hitomi getting closer to Van any more than she had wanted five years ago. She had been rather jealous of Hitomi back then, because up until the fortune-teller's arrival from the Mystic Moon, Merle had been the only person who was truly close to Van. And though it was not easy, the past five years had taught her to share. After a while, she didn't mind when Van wore the rose colored pendant everywhere he went, or when he shared a drink with Wellyn, or when all those princesses and noblewomen visited the castle to court him for his hand in marriage.

Even when Hitomi came back, Merle was overjoyed to see her. But once Merle saw the ring on her hand, all the old suspicion and jealousy flooded back, stronger than it ever had before. And since that moment, she hated Hitomi. Five years ago, Merle may have harassed, taunted, and insinuated, but she never hated. Now, she hated the way Hitomi could make Van's eyes light up or become downcast within the same breath. She hated they way Van stared after Hitomi like a lost puppy. She hated the way Hitomi made _her _feel.

How _did _Hitomi make her feel? Ears twitching in agitation, Merle tried to push away the nameless sentiment that poked its nose into her belly. She was Van's friend, nothing more, nothing less. Of course he had to marry a princess or somebody like that; there was no way a king could marry a cat. _Or a girl from the Mystic Moon_, she thought smugly. _Especially not when she has someone else's ring on her finger_.

But nobody could make his eyes come to life the way Hitomi did. Not even Merle.

"Van-sama!" Merle exclaimed in consternation. The ragged edges of Van's shirt had caught her eye, jolting her out of her reverie. Her Van-sama was walking through the streets of Palas dressed like a pauper? Why hadn't she noticed this before? She grabbed his shoulder and turned him around. The entire back of his shirt was ripped almost in half, as if something had burst its way through. "You showed your wings again, didn't you?" she accused.

"Well, yes, I—" he stammered, like a cat who had been caught with one paw in the fishbowl. "I had no choice, Merle. I had to save Clara's son. And Hitomi and Clara already know about them, so it's not—"

"You've gone and ruined a perfectly good shirt, Van-sama," she fussed, pushing him to the edge of the street, out of the way of human traffic, all the way out to the bank of one of the canals. "What are we going to do now? You can't go walking around like that!"

"Yeah, you're right." He reached his hands under the edge of his shirt and pulled it over his head. Now his torso was completely bare, his skin the color of coffee milk from all the afternoons of practicing sword forms in the sun. The remains of the shirt dangled from his hand, a tattered green flag.

"Van-sama! You can't walk around like _that_, either!" Merle protested, and her cheeks reddened, even though she had seen him shirtless countless times before.

"I suppose you're right. You can buy me another one when we pass by the marketplace." But his shoulders were much more relaxed, and his face, no longer stern, was almost smiling.

"Van-samaaaa," she whined playfully. Well, at least she was able to distract him.

But their lighthearted teasing was short-lived. As they stood by the canal, a shadow came over Van's eyes like a cloud passing over the sun. "Merle, I don't know if Fanelia exists anymore," he said quietly.

Merle went cold, despite the humid sea air of Palas, and her hair rose on end as goosebumps dotted her arms. "What do you mean, Van-sama?" she asked, even though she did not really want to hear the answer.

"Fanelia is disappearing, Merle."

"…Disappearing?"

"Half the forest is gone. Arzas is gone. The ground is breaking up, and the land is filled with lava. Hitomi and I almost got caught in it, but we escaped just in time."

_Arzas is gone?_ Merle was having trouble making sense of what Van was saying, her thoughts straggling behind like a lame horse. _The forest is filled with lava? And Fanelia…?_

"It kept spreading, all the way across the main road, surrounding the city. I don't know if there's anything left." He lifted his eyes, no longer a battle-hardened king but a boy who had lost his parents and his brother, and now his home. "I was so afraid, Merle. I couldn't stay. I couldn't bear to watch Fanelia disappear." He hung his head, and his voice dropped even lower. "I'm such a coward."

"Van-sama…" she mewed as his words sank in._ The ground is breaking up. The ground under Fanelia. It's disappearing. It's…really disappearing. _She threw her arms around him and started to bawl into his neck. "Van-samaaaa!"

Van put his arms around her as she cried, her tears damp streaks on the side of his neck. He felt like crying himself, and his eyes welled up, but they did not spill over. He had never felt so orphaned in his life. This was different from the time when Zaibach torched Fanelia to the ground; at least the burning desire for revenge kept him from thinking too much about what he had lost. But this time, there was no enemy but nature itself. And this time, there might not be anything left of Fanelia to come back to.

Merle's sobbing gradually faded into sniffles and hiccups. The slow waters of the canal flowed under the wooden docks, lapping at the struts, tranquil and inevitable as the passage of time. If Fanelia was carried away, where would they go? What would he do?

-

Millerna Sara Aston, the youngest of King Aston's three beautiful daughters, was unable to hide her surprise at the sight of Hitomi, even though she had been expecting her all afternoon.

"_Hitomi?_ Is that really you?" she exclaimed in astonishment as a young woman in her twenties was ushered into the sitting room. She had expected a tomboy with shockingly short hair wearing the odd pleated skirt and blazer that were in style on the Mystic Moon. Instead, in front of her stood a woman with sleek brown hair gathered into two long braids, looking quite feminine in a creamy yellow dress.

"Princess Millerna!" Hitomi said, and Millerna rose to meet her. The two women embraced, and Hitomi hugged her tight. "Oh Millerna, I'm so happy to see you!"

"Me too, Hitomi." Millerna held the younger woman at arm's length, admiring the transformation that the last five years had wrought. "You look wonderful."

"So do you." Then Hitomi pulled away and held up her left hand, which was adorned with a simple diamond ring. "And before anyone else asks," she said, twisting off the ring and thrusting it onto the opposite hand, "Van and I are _not _getting married."

"Oh." Millerna was not quite sure what was going on. "Are the two of you quarreling?"

Silently, Hitomi shook her head. When she looked up, her eyes were shining with tears. "Oh Millerna, I don't know what to do!"

Shushing her gently, Millerna settled Hitomi in one of the armchairs by a bay of windows in the sitting room. "There, there. Now tell me, what's going on between you two?"

Hitomi took a deep breath and composed herself. "You see, Millerna…I'm engaged. I'm engaged, but not to Van."

"What?" Millerna blurted out before she could stop herself.

"It's true," Hitomi said, nervously curling her fingers under her palms. "It's been five years, Millerna. How was I supposed to know I was going to come back?"

Millerna gazed at Hitomi wonderingly. She remembered how jealous she had been of Hitomi and Van, of the love they shared, a love that was pure and unfettered by burdens of the past or fears about the future. They simply loved, and there was no doubt in anyone's mind that their love would never change.

She looked at Hitomi's ring, which was jammed just below the lower knuckle of the fourth finger on her right hand, the diamonds twisted around and wedged into the side of her pinky. _Can it be possible that it hasn't changed at all? _she wondered.

With her elbows balanced on the arms of her own chair, Millerna bridged her fingers together and rested her chin on top, carefully observing woman in front of her. "So you met someone else? From the Mystic Moon?"

"Yes," Hitomi replied, absently playing with the end of one of her braids.

"What's his name? What's he like?"

"His name is Yutaro. He's incredibly smart and he has a great sense of humor. He's a very sweet and caring person."

"How long have you been engaged?"

"About three months."

"And you want to marry him?"

"Yes. That's why we're engaged."

Millerna paused for a moment, considering. "Do you still love Van?"

Hitomi looked down and bit her lip. "I—I don't know. If some part of me didn't love him, I wouldn't be this confused, would I?"

_It must be so hard. Poor girl_. Millerna reached out and touched Hitomi's arm. "Does he still love you?" she asked gently.

Hitomi stopped fidgeting with her braid. "I think so. I mean, he gets so angry when people ask me about the ring. And then there are times when we're together and it feels like I've never left." Her fingers flew to her mouth, a sieve trying to catch the words before any more came out. "That's what makes it so hard," she managed in a choked voice, and broke down in tears.

Millerna got up and drew Hitomi into her arms, soothingly stroking the top of her head until she calmed down. She offered her a handkerchief, and Hitomi accepted it thankfully, using it to dab at her eyes. "I wasn't supposed to come back," Hitomi said, sniffling. "I shouldn't have come back. How can I love two men at the same time?"

There was a knock at the door. _Oh, honestly,_ Millerna thought, annoyed._ What could they possibly want?_ She opened the door, standing so her body was blocking the view to the rest of the room.

To her surprise, it was Allen and a slender woman who had silky white hair, despite having a face not much younger than Millerna's. "Allen?"

"Good afternoon, Princess," he said. "Is this a bad time?"

The timing could not have been worse, but she ignored the question. "Is it important?"

"I hate to impose, but could you watch Celena for a while? There's nobody else available, and the King has called a meeting that I need to attend."

"Well…all right," she relented.

"Thank you, Princess."

"Try to be back soon, ok?"

"I'll try."

When Allen left, Millerna led Celena into the room. "Celena, you probably don't remember her, but this is one of my friends, Kanzaki Hitomi," she said by way of introduction.

Hitomi held out a hand. "Nice to meet you."

But Celena only stared at her outstretched hand and did not move or even curtsy. "Nice…to meet you," she said softly.

Millerna sighed inwardly. "Celena, dear, please have a seat." She glided to a bookshelf and picked out several books, the ones that had the most pictures. "What would you like to read today? _The Legend of Jeture_? _The Royal Castles of Asturia_? Or _High Seas and High Adventure_?"

"_The Legend of Jeture_ is fine," she said in the same soft, eerie voice.

"Here you go, then," Millerna said and handed the young woman a book bound in dark red leather with gold-tipped corners.

When Millerna sat back down, she saw the questions in Hitomi's eyes. "Ever since Celena returned, she's been like this. I think that being…that other person…for so long has robbed her of her childhood. As a result, she has the mind of a ten-year-old child. Also," and here she waved Hitomi closer, her voice dropping to a whisper, "you mustn't mention Zaibach or Dilandau around her. She finds it…distressing."

Hitomi nodded and cast a nervous glance at the white-haired woman sitting on the sofa only a few feet away. Allen's younger sister, who was also the former madman of a military commander for Zaibach, was quietly absorbed with the book in her lap. Millerna had never met Dilandau in person, but Hitomi had, and Millerna imagined that the circumstances were not pleasant. But anybody would be uneasy around this strange girl with her quiet, ghostlike way of speaking and eyes that watched your every move.

"We can't leave her by herself, either," she continued in hushed tones. "Being alone upsets her." _"Upset" is an understatement_, Millerna thought to herself, remembering how Celena would cry—a lonely, high-pitched wail that chilled Millerna to the bone—and throw violent tantrums, smashing everything in sight. "That's why Allen always has to watch her, and when he has to be somewhere, he sometimes asks me to do it."

"Oh, that's terrible," Hitomi whispered back. "How has Allen been taking it?"

"Very patiently. I have never seen a more loving brother. He dotes on her, and he wants nothing more than for her to be happy. She's all he has left."

"How are you and Allen, by the way?" Hitomi asked, more conversationally.

Millerna sighed again, this time out loud, and smoothed the folds in the pink chiffon of her dress. "I still love him, but it's not like it was before. Ever since the war ended, ever since _she _came back," a quick motion of her head indicated the white-haired Celena, "he hardly has the time or energy for anyone else. I don't fault him for it, and it actually makes me love him all the more. But it's been hard." Millerna looked out the window, at the clouds drifting lazily across the bright, sapphire-blue sky. "There are times when I can't help feeling that I'm only second best. Good enough, but not…"

Millerna trailed off, struggling with what had always lurked in the back of her mind but had never been given voice. "Not Marlene," she finally said, turning back to Hitomi. "Or Celena."

"Oh Millerna," Hitomi said, her voice brimming with sympathy. "I had no idea."

Millerna shrugged. "Well, if it doesn't work out, there's always Dryden," she said lightly. "We're still engaged, after all. I haven't seen him in years, but he recently returned to Asturia. Only Jeture knows where that man has been all this time."

An awkward silence fell, neither woman able to find the right words to say. Hitomi was the first one to speak again. "I'm so sorry, Millerna. I had no idea how hard it must be for you. I shouldn't have gone and dumped all my problems on you."

"It's all right, Hitomi. Life is never easy, so we just have to try to make the best of it while we can, right?" Millerna said, trying to sound as cheerful as possible. "But it's a miracle that you're here at all, and just seeing you again is enough to make me happy."

Hitomi flashed her a grateful smile. "Me too. I don't know what I would do if you weren't here, Millerna." Then her smile faded, and her hand went to the pendant around her neck. "But there's something that's been bothering me. Ever since I arrived, there has been nothing but disaster after disaster in Fanelia. I think that my return to Gaea has something to do with it."

"How can that be? Don't be silly."

The other woman shook her head, her braids swinging back and forth. "There's something I have to tell you. This isn't something that many people know, but—" And abruptly, she broke off, leaving the rest of the sentence hanging.

Millerna waited for Hitomi to continue, but her mouth had frozen in mid-sentence. "Hitomi?" She passed a hand in front of Hitomi's eyes, which only stared blankly ahead.

_Is she having a vision?_ Suddenly, Hitomi gasped, a sharp intake of air as if she had just started to breathe again, and she looked at Millerna with green eyes that were dark with fear. She reached forth and grabbed Millerna's hands, and Millerna almost gasped herself because Hitomi's fingers were cold as ice.

"The giants are coming, Millerna! Asturia is going to be attacked!"

"Giants? But there are no such thing as giants."

"I know—no, I mean, I don't know—I don't understand it, either. But I saw the giants, the ice giants, and they're coming to destroy Palas. Please, Millerna, we have to let King Aston and the others know, before it's too late!"

Before Millerna had the chance to react, Hitomi's eyelids fluttered, her eyes rolling up into her head, and she slumped over in the chair. "Hitomi? Hitomi!" Millerna tried shaking her and patting her cheeks, but there was no response. She grabbed one of Hitomi's wrists and a wave of relief washed over her when she found the pulse; it was slow, but steady. A hand on the woman's forehead told her that Hitomi did not have a fever, but she was as cold as frostbite on a winter day.

Pulling Hitomi from her chair, Millerna leaned back against the wall and hugged Hitomi's body close, trying to deliver as much of her own body heat as possible. "Celena," she called, and Celena's pale face lifted from her book. "Celena, please be a dear and find me one of the servants. Anyone will do."

Celena raised her hand, a balled-up fist containing a crumpled page from _The Legend of Jeture_. Staring at it in wonder, she opened her fingers and watched as the wad of paper dropped into her lap and bounced onto the floor. Millerna wasn't sure if the girl had even heard what she said. But Celena rose to her feet, swanlike and graceful, and floated out the door.

_Please hurry, Celena_, Millerna thought anxiously as she listened to Hitomi's shallow breathing. Although Hitomi's visions were never wrong, this one was unusual to the point of being bizarre. It was the middle of summer, and Asturia was nowhere near Asgard, the only place that Millerna could even fathom having ice giants, whatever those were. It was impossible. But then again, she would have thought that falling unconscious from hypothermia on a hot summer day was impossible, too. As she cradled Hitomi's cold body, a chill began to creep through her own body, spreading through her from the inside out.


	9. Premonitions

Author's note: Probably my shortest chapter yet. It was either that or it was going to be way too long.

-

**The Last Night of the World**

**Chapter 8**

**Premonitions**

-

Unable to see, Hitomi groped for each step with her feet as Yutaro carefully guided her up the stairs. They reached the landing, and after walking some distance, they came to a halt.

There was a jangle of metal followed by the unlatching of a bolt. A doorknob turned, and a door opened with a slight squeak of the hinges. "Ok, you can open your eyes now."

Giggling, Hitomi pulled Yutaro's hands away, which had been covering her eyes from behind. Her giggles turned into a sigh of wonder when she saw that the living room of her tiny one-bedroom apartment had been transformed into a banquet room fit for a king. The walls were festooned with satiny pink and silver, the loops of rich fabric hugging the ceiling before cascading down the corners of the room. Her futon and armchair had disappeared (into her bedroom, she hoped) and in the middle of the floor stood a small round table draped in a crisp white tablecloth with chairs on either side. There were tall champagne glasses and two slim red candles nestled in golden candle holders with a single crimson rose lying between them. The room was lit by a fire crackling cheerfully in the fireplace—which Hitomi had never used before—and the smell of something wonderful floated through the air.

"Oh, Yutaro," Hitomi breathed, "you shouldn't have. It's just my birthday, you know, nothing special."

Yutaro drew her close and said, "_You're _special."

Laughing, Hitomi brushed her hand through his short golden-brown hair, over his ear. "You are so corny."

"I thought you might like it, that's all," Yutaro said, smiling. The reflection from the fireplace danced in the gray of his eyes.

"I love it," she said, and kissed him.

As their kiss ended, music started to play from the speakers of her stereo system, slow jazz and violins.

_I can't stop loving you  
I've made up my mind_

_How did he do that? And without me noticing? _she wondered. "Hmm? What's this?" she mumbled, Yutaro's breath pleasantly tickling her face.

_To live in memories  
of the lonesome times_

"Ray Charles," he replied. "It's an American song. I thought it would be romantic."

_I can't stop wanting you  
It's useless to say  
So I'll just live my life  
in dreams of yesterday_

Instead of answering, Hitomi put her arms around his neck and they swayed together to the cool beat of the music, their feet drifting across the carpet, moving in slow circles, the dance of lovers lost in a world that belonged to them alone.

After a while, Yutaro unhooked her arms and said, "Hitomi, there's something I have to ask you."

Suddenly her heart was in her throat. _Something to ask me? Could it be…? _she thought feverishly._ No, too obvious. What if it turns out he's just asking me to move in with him or something?_ _Well, it wouldn't **just** be moving in, but what if I'm making this out to be a bigger deal than—_

Yutaro dropped to one knee, and a small box appeared in his hand. He opened the lid, and all she could see was the gleam of the smooth gold band that was tucked in the deep red velvet and diamonds that glittered like three dewdrops.

"Will you marry me?"

For a moment, Hitomi was speechless. When she found her voice again, her throat was filled with cotton. "Of course I will, Yutaro," she said. She threw her arms around him, her eyes filling with happy tears. "Of course I will."

They kissed again, and Hitomi no longer heard the music or felt the floor beneath her; there was nothing, nothing but Yutaro. His lips knew her better than anyone else's ever had—the shape of her mouth, the way her lips fit together, the way she liked it when he ran the tip of his tongue over the corner of her mouth.

When they finally drew apart, she leaned her head on his shoulder, kneeling on the floor with him, his arms encircling her. She closed her eyes and breathed the clean scent of his cologne and the smell of his skin. "Yutaro," she murmured as he nuzzled her hair and brushed her earlobe with his lips.

"Hitomi," he said. Her eyes flew open and she went rigid, because it was not Yutaro who had said her name. It was Van.

Pulling back, she saw that Van was now the one holding her. Thick strands of hair, dark and wild, were strewn across his face. He stared at her, saying nothing. His eyes were haunted with the look of someone who had lost everything and knew the kind of sorrow that was deeper than the darkest night sky. His gaze was so intense that she shifted uncomfortably. "Van…?"

Then Hitomi noticed that everything else had changed around her. The strains of the Ray Charles song had faded away, and her apartment had become a barren landscape of mountains and plateaus dotted with brush, the scraggly leaves brown and withered. Black clouds gathered in the sky above, seething and roiling, a turbulent landscape all its own. Suddenly Hitomi felt very, very alone.

A soft pattering reached her ears, and it quickly became louder until it sounded like gravel raining onto the rocky soil. All around them, chunks of ice fell from the sky, some no bigger than pebbles, some the size of her fist. Hail. They needed to get to somewhere safe, to find shelter from the storm.

Turning back to Van, she said, "Van, we have to—" and barely managed to stifle a scream. Van's skin was the color of granite, and the rest of him—his hair, his eyes, his clothes—had also turned the same stony shade of gray. His arms were cold and held her in a stiff, awkward embrace. His stone eyes continued to stare at her, intent and unblinking.

"Van?" she whispered fearfully as rocks of ice continued to fall around them. With a trembling hand, she touched his face, which was smooth as marble and colder than the wind that sliced through her clothes. Unable to move her hand from his stony cheek, unable to break her eyes away from his lifeless gaze, Hitomi began to scream, and the world fell out from under her.

"_VAAAAAAN!_"

-

Hitomi awoke with a start, breathing hard. _A dream_, she realized. _Thank God, it was just a dream_.

"Hitomi? Are you all right?"

She almost screamed again on hearing Van's voice. It took all she had to keep herself together. The image of Van's eyes, his empty stone eyes, was etched so deeply into her mind that she still saw it even with her eyes open. When she finally dared to look at him, he was standing over her, his face full of concern, his eyes beautifully brown and warm.

"Thank goodness," she said brokenly, almost crying. Without knowing it, she had been clinging to his hand this whole time. Her hands climbed up his arm, and her forehead came to rest in the crook of his elbow. Flesh and blood, warm with life. "Thank goodness, Van. Thank goodness."

"Hitomi?" he asked again. He squatted next to the bed and gently laid his other hand on her shoulder.

"You gave us quite a scare, little lady. Glad to see you're awake." It was Dryden who had spoken. Then it came to her that she and Van were not alone; there were other people in the room, too.

Now that she was fully awake, Hitomi was utterly mortified. Straightening, she looked over Van's shoulder and saw Millerna, Allen, and Celena standing next to Dryden. How must she look, a babbling idiot jumping at her own shadow? And clinging to Van like this?

Hitomi carefully disengaged herself from him, and Millerna hurried to her side, laying the palm of her hand on Hitomi's cheek and then her forehead. "How are you feeling?" Millerna asked.

"I feel…" _Embarrassed. _"I feel fine," Hitomi said shakily. "What happened?"

"While we were in my apartments, talking, you had a vision and you collapsed. You were colder than ice, so we put you in bed and tried to warm you up."

Indeed, there were five or six blankets wrapped around her. Hitomi remembered having the vision in Millerna's sitting room, and now that she thought about it, she also remembered feeling very cold. _I've always felt the things that happened in my visions, but that was the first one that's affected me like this_._ What could it mean?_

"What did you see, Hitomi?" asked Van, who still hovered by her side.

A wave of cold rose through her belly as she recalled her vision. "There were giants in Palas…giants made of ice, destroying everything…and there was ice everywhere."

"Are you sure it was Palas?" Dryden asked skeptically. "Perhaps it was a city in the mountains or in Asgard."

Hitomi shook her head, remembering the bridges over the frozen waterways. "I'm certain it was Palas, unless there's another city on Gaea that's full of canals."

"Impossible," Dryden said. "It's the middle of the summer. You must have seen something at some point far into the future. Which means we don't have anything to worry about for several months."

"Hitomi's visions are never wrong," Van heatedly declared, and stood to face the older man. "What she saw is going to happen, and it's going to happen soon."

Dryden only chuckled and shook his head at the younger man's impetuousness while Van glared at him. Then, for the first time, Allen spoke. "How big were the giants, Hitomi?"

"Let me see… About as tall as a building, I think." The image of a featureless, blue-white monster made of ice swiping the roof off a house surfaced in her mind. "No, taller."

"Would you say they were the size of, say, a Guymelef?" he asked.

Suddenly, Hitomi saw what it was he was really asking. "Yes, about the same size, maybe a little bigger."

"We have the description of the enemy and the advantage of being forewarned," Allen said. "We should be able to limit the amount of damage they will cause."

"That's brilliant, Allen!" Millerna said. "We must let father know at once so he knows to be prepared."

But as Millerna rose to her feet, Allen held up a hand. "Princess, Dryden and I will take care of it. You have a patient who needs looking after."

_And Celena_, Hitomi added silently, and she could tell from the way a shadow fell across Millerna's face that the Asturian princess was thinking the same thing. The room darkened as a blanket of heavy gray clouds rolled across the sun. Rain began to streak the windowpanes.

"Let's go. We haven't a moment to spare," Allen said, and headed for the door. Dryden trailed after him, his expression one of amusement mingled with doubt.

Van moved to follow them, but Hitomi caught his hand. "Please, don't go."

He turned to her in surprise. "What do you mean? I have to help them fight. They're giving refuge to Fanelia's people, and they're our allies besides. I can't leave them hanging out to dry."

The rain continued to fall, no longer droplets of water but hard pellets that tapped against the glass before falling into the courtyard below. Sleet. What was sleet but a smaller version of hail? Hitomi felt cold again, despite the blankets. Van's unblinking stone eyes still stared at her in her mind. "Don't go," she pleaded. "If you go, you might die."

His expression hardened, and he pulled his hand away. "A samurai cannot be a coward afraid of death. Much less a king," he said, suddenly distant. It was as if a wall had come up between them.

"Van, listen to me," she protested as he walked away. "Van, I saw it! You might die!"

That made him stop in his tracks. "What do you mean?"

"I…I saw…" She could still feel the arms of granite around her, a statue's embrace, trapping her body, her sanity. Her voice faltered.

"What did you see, Hitomi?" Millerna prompted.

How could she explain that Van might turn to stone if he went out in the hail without sounding like a complete lunatic? As if the ice giants weren't bad enough. _And it wasn't even a vision…it was just a dream. _"It's just a feeling I have."

Van paused at the threshold as if weighing what she said. Then, without another word, he left.

"Van…" Dream or not, Hitomi still couldn't shake the feeling that something bad was going to happen. Throwing aside the blankets, she tried to go after him. But when her feet touched the floor, her legs gave way and Millerna had to catch her. "_Van!_" she cried in desperation.

"Hitomi, you're not strong enough to be moving around yet," Millerna cautioned, and settled Hitomi back into bed, who struggled weakly against her.

"But…Van…" Hitomi said helplessly.

By now, the sleet had grown to balls of ice that rattled the windowpanes and crushed the flowers lining the fountain in the courtyard. "Don't worry, he'll be fine," Millerna said reassuringly. But the sudden coming of the hail must have unnerved her as well, because her fingers tightened around Hitomi's hand. "They all will."

-

-

Author's note #2: I'm not sure when I'll be able to get the next chapter out—this week is about to get pretty busy, pretty fast. But I already have some of it done, so who knows, maybe I'll even surprise myself


	10. Descent of Madness

Author's Note: I hate writing action. Everything could be a lot better, but I refuse to work on it any more ;P

On rewrites: I've made some significant changes to the Prologue, Return to Gaea (ch. 2), and Broken Bonds (ch. 4). Nothing that changes the overall plot, but the characterization is much different and much better. I'd love for you to read them again, but you don't need to if you just want to see what happens next ;)

-

**The Last Night of the World**

**Chapter 9**

**Descent of Madness**

**- **

Van ran to the Guymelef enclosure, holding his arms over his head to shield himself from the hail that mercilessly pelted his back. _Why is it hailing now, all of sudden? Maybe it has something to do with Hitomi's vision. _He reached the shelter of the enclosure, and he watched the hail fall, a rain of pebbles and ice, from the safety of the doorway. _In any case, it can't be a good omen._

He headed deeper into the enclosure where Escaflowne was kept. The dragon armor stood in resplendent Ispano white, the green jewels that graced the shoulders and cockpit catching the dim light of the enclosure. As Van came closer, the facets of the energist chamber on the chest began to glow softly. That was odd—it rarely did that on its own. And when it did, it usually heralded the beginning of some strange and dramatic event. Van approached carefully, mentally probing the structure of the Guymelef. Nothing seemed out of place. The energist chamber continued to glow dull red.

There was nothing to do but to keep going. The control chamber opened on his command, and he settled himself inside. He inserted his arms into the sockets that controlled Escaflowne's arms and threaded his fingers through the hollow fingerholds which seemed like they were made to just fit his hands. He closed his hands around the metal bars that connected him to the levers and gears of the dragon armor's skeleton and hooked his feet under the stirrups of the pedals. The chamber lock secured itself across his chest, and Van reached out with his mind and felt the gears catch and turn as he took a step forward, the pistons hissing as they churned back and forth. _Escaflowne's body is my body. Escaflowne's pain is my pain. No longer the pain of war, but the pain of…_

Of what?

The uncertainty of Fanelia's fate was an empty hole in his heart that gnawed away at him. All because he was a coward. The captain went down with the ship, but the king of Fanelia couldn't even stay behind to witness the destruction of his country. Even Prince Chid had watched as Freid burned. But as Fanelia fell to the wrath of nature, Van had turned on his tail and fled under the guise of needing to reach Asturia quickly. He marched irritably through the enclosure, his armored steps stamping more loudly than he intended. Asturia's fight was his fight. He would not turn his back and run this time.

When he reached the doorway, he halted and peered out from the grill of his face shield. The hail was still coming down and showed no signs of letting up. The ground was covered with a thick layer of icy rock. Footing would be treacherous in these conditions.

Van noticed that his Guymelef was the only one that had been mobilized out of the entire enclosure, which held several platoons. Was it possible that King Aston did not believe them when Van and Allen confronted him with the news of Hitomi's vision? The king had consented to provide the necessary forces to counter this threat; yet in this section of the city, the cluster of melef enclosures remained quiet, and the only person who had stirred was himself. _What the hell is Aston playing at?_ he wondered, scowling.

He guided Escaflowne outside, the hailstones crunching and scattering beneath his feet. Hitomi's vision was the strangest one yet, that was true, but ever since Hitomi had first arrived on Gaea, Van had discovered that anything could be possible. Invisible Guymelefs and fate-determining machines. Atlantis and the Mystic Moon. Visions and the power of wishes.

The hail continued to fall, bouncing off Escaflowne's hull in dull metallic _thunk_s, a stampede of rock and ice. The humid summer air had cooled to a heavy, stifling chill, against which Van's loose, sleeveless shirt proved defenseless. The cold had worked its way into Escaflowne's armor, too. The metal tips of the fingerholds were like small, frozen weights on his hands and the wide rings that encased his shoulders seemed to radiate an icy aura of their own

He shivered. It was not just the cold. Hitomi's words still rang in his head: _"Van, you might die! I saw it! You might die!"_

_What did she see? _he wondered as he scanned the street in front of him. _Why wouldn't she tell me? _

The hail was coming down so thick that he could barely make out the outlines of the buildings lining the street. The sky was as dark and steely as a winter afternoon. But for the clattering of hailstones on clay tiles and cobblestone, the city was quiet. Van shifted nervously and reached behind his back to grasp the hilt of Escaflowne's sword. The only thing worse than the knowledge of an attack was the calm before the strike.

There was a noise behind him, something heavy dragging through the ice. Van whirled around, his massive sword at the ready. He waited, hardly breathing. He could hardly see through the hail. Where was it? Where was it going to strike? Would he be able to see it before it pierced his gut? Or would it crush his skull without any warning?

Then he felt a familiar pull at the edge of his mind, the feeling of something that was just out of place. Van spun around and barely caught the downswing of a huge shaft of ice where the blade of his sword met the hilt. What he saw froze him to the spot. In front of him was a creature that could have been carved out of the side of a mountain in Asgard. No, carved was the wrong word—hammered out with a huge ice pick was more like it. Its body was featureless and irregular, a misshapen hunk of solid ice with arms and legs thick as oak trees. Before Van could react, the other arm swung at him and connected squarely with Escaflowne's midsection, sending him sprawling.

At first, he could not feel his body. Then his stomach began to pulse with pain. He tried to get up, but the ice monster was on top of him. A rocky fist came down at his head, but he heaved himself to the side as it pounded a crater into the ground. He scrambled through the hailstones that covered the street like glass marbles, trying to pick himself up off the ground. He was able to get to one knee, but when he tried to stand, his foot slipped and he landed on his shoulder with a crash.

_Damn!_ Van pushed his hand off the ground and rolled onto his back, avoiding a deadlystomp that would have punched a hole through his chest. _There's no way I can fight back like this!_

When the next swing came, he blocked it with the flat of his blade. Just as expected, the monster tried to counter with the other fist. But instead of dodging it, Van let go of the sword and caught the blow between both hands. The bones in his hands felt as if they would shatter, but he hung on. Enraged, the giant flung its arm around violently, attempting to shake him off. Escaflowne's legs dangled several feet off the ground as the giant whipped him around like a straw doll.

Finding steady footing was no easy task. It was all Van could do to hold on, let alone find the right time to let go. Furious at Van's tenacity, the monster flung its arm in a wide circle and slammed him into the side of a building. His head rattled from the impact as brick and stone rained down around him, and he slumped against the wall. He instinctively crossed both arms in front of him as the giant lunged at him again and was driven deeper into the wall.

_Damn it…I need my sword._ _Where is my sword?_ Then he saw it, the hilt rising up like a golden beacon and the blade buried beneath the hailstones. The monster struck at Van again, but he caught its fist and held on only long enough to be pulled away from the wall. His feet skidded through the ice-strewn street, and he reached down and grabbed his sword as it passed him by. Seeing that its prey had escaped, the monster whirled around and charged. But Van was ready, and as the giant hauled its arm back to deliver another crushing blow, Van thrust his sword through the monster's chest.

The ice monster fell to its knees. The arm dropped limply at its side and its blocky shoulders shuddered in a disturbingly human way. Slightly sick to his stomach, Van tightened his hand around the hilt and withdrew his sword.

The blade was smeared with something thick and dark red. _Blood?_ He looked at the giant's chest, from where a fountain of red poured from the wound. For the first time, he noticed a dark shadow in the middle of its chest, just underneath the ice. _Is that where it's coming from? Why would an ice giant bleed?_

But this was not the time to wonder. If there was one giant, there were probably more. Van waded through the streets, straining his ears for any sign of struggle. He soon came upon a hulking figure, its features difficult to distinguish through the curtain of hail. With a growl, he rushed at it with his sword, aiming for the chest.

Suddenly, something knocked his sword away and he nearly lost his grip on the hilt. The tip of a blade rushed directly at his head but veered away at the last minute, the wind of its passing making Van's hair fan out across his face.

"We're on the same side, Van," a familiar voice called.

"Allen!" Now that he was closer, Van saw the Scherazade standing in front of him, flashes of blue steel and bronze through the hail. Next to Allen lay a fallen giant, a crumpled pile of blood-drenched ice. "Where are the rest of the Guymelefs?"

"It seems that the king didn't take our concerns seriously," Allen said grimly. "It will be up to us to protect Palas until the commanders realize what's going on."

"Where did these things come from?"

"I don't know. They're mindless and predictable, but they're also fast and very powerful, so we have to watch our backs."

"Right." A siren blared in the distance, a call to arms piercing through the monotonous cascade of hail, and a cloud of smoke rose over the rooftops in the eastern part of the city. The two men lumbered toward the fray, only to be blocked off by the appearance of two more giants.

Allen brandished his sword, which had also been anointed with blood. "I'll hold off the one in front so you can slip around and take out the other one." The first giant lunged at the knight, but he swiftly parried the blow.

Van quickly ducked under Scherazade's sword and swiped at the feet of the other giant. His sword sliced at one leg, but ended up becoming lodged in the thick ankle. He managed to yank it free, but not before the giant clipped him on the side of the head. Van staggered backward, arching his back awkwardly and fighting to keep his balance on the slick street. The giant tried to strike him again, forcing him to block wildly. _This wouldn't be so hard if it wasn't so slippery_, he thought. _I'm barely holding my own against these guys!_

_"Van!"_

"Hitomi?" For a split second, he thought Hitomi had somehow been able to find him in the middle of the fight. But then he realized that her voice wasn't coming from any one direction. She was speaking to him in his mind, the way she did during the war when he had nearly killed Allen.

_"You have to stop, Van!" _she begged in urgent tones. _"There are—" _

Another fist that came his way, distracting him from what she said next. The monster battered relentlessly at his outstretched sword, pushing him along the street. _It's like they have no fear at all_, he realized. _If only I can find an opening—there!_

Van dodged another punch and swung his sword around, arcing down like a deadly pendulum, carving a large gash through the giant's shoulder and into the chest. Blood gushed from the wound and soaked the icy ground in deep crimson. Large drops spattered onto Escaflowne's armor, streaks of red rain on ivory.

_"Please stop, Van! You can't keep fighting!"_

"I am not going to run away," he swore. He pulled his arm back to remove the sword from the fallen giant, but he found that he could not move.

_What the…?_ Pulling harder, he was only able to slide the sword out by a fraction. But at least he could do it. He strained against the hilt with all his might, and he nearly fell backwards when it suddenly gave. The giant, wounded and slick with blood, collapsed in a heap.

Then Escaflowne seemed to move on its own, slowly and laboriously, taking one step, then another, away from the fighting on the other side of the city. _What the hell is going on?_

Gritting his teeth, Van tried to reverse his steps in mid-stride. It took all his strength and willpower to keep his leg frozen in mid-air, refusing to take a step forward and unable to take a step back. Why wasn't Escaflowne obeying him?

_"Van!" _Hitomi again. _"You and Allen need to stop fighting!"_

With a great crash, Escaflowne planted its foot on the ground, and Van gasped from the sudden loss of control. _Hitomi…Hitomi must be the one doing this!_

"I am not going to run away!"

_"There are people, Van. There are people inside!"_

Suddenly it felt as if his limbs had turned to ice. "What do you mean?"

_"There are people trapped in the ice!"_

"What?" What on Gaea was she talking about? People? He didn't see any people. Van tried to turn around, but it was like pushing against an invisible wall. "What are you doing?" he growled. "Let me go!"

As he struggled against Hitomi, a pale shape began to rise from the ground. A sinking feeling gripped his stomach as he watched hailstones gather and merge, piling up and giving birth to a large, humanoid body. When the giant was fully formed, it lumbered at him like a charging bull. Van tried to defend himself, but it was like his arms were made of wood. The monster hammered a fist into Van's chest. For a minute, he could not breathe. He staggered backwards into the side of a building and his head smacked sharply against the wall. Something warm dripped down his face, a blur of red in the corner of his eye.

The giant swung at him again, and this time Van was able to block it with his forearm, but he might as well have tried to stop a battering ram with his bare flesh. A cry of pain escaped through his clenched teeth.

_"There are innocent people in there!" _Hitomi pleaded, sounding almost in tears._ "Please, Van, take Allen and run!"_

The monster's fists continued to batter his body, and he grunted with every blow. "I—will—not—run!" he said, pulling each word through teeth clenched against the pain. The blurry red in his vision grew stronger, brighter, illuminating the icy battlefield in crimson light. The dark shadow in the giant's chest became clearer, its outline sharpening and revealing a twisted shape with limbs kinked at awkward angles. The last thing he saw was a nameless face contorted in fear, the teeth bared in a feral cry, before he was taken by the red light.

-

When Hitomi collapsed in the sitting room, Millerna had been concerned. When Hitomi woke up clinging to Van as if she had seen a demon, her concern grew. Then the hail came. Now Hitomi had one of the blankets balled up in her hands, her eyes fixed and gazing off into space and looking terrified.

The men had left the room some time ago, leaving Millerna to keep watch over Hitomi and Celena. Neither of her charges said much, and the silence, coupled with the wet sound of hail hitting the ground, was unsettling. Then out of nowhere, Hitomi started to call out after Van. Millerna went from being concerned to feeling disturbed. Celena, who was sitting in a chair by the empty fireplace, apparently felt the same way. The white-haired girl gave a start every time Hitomi cried out Van's name, her fingers fitfully crumpling and tugging at the lace on the skirt of her dress. Millerna frowned. If Celena ripped the cloth, Allen would have to buy her another dress. Millerna understood that Allen's sister had suffered what no human being should experience, but there were times when she wished that Celena knew how to better appreciate what Allen endured for her. She wished that Celena would not make her feel as if she were caring for a baby tiger whose paws were soft and whose claws were sharp.

Millerna sat on the edge of Hitomi's bed and cautiously placed a hand on the blankets over the other woman's knee. "Hitomi, what are you seeing?"

"It's Van," Hitomi said, her fingers white and quivering at her lips. "He's killing innocent people!"

"_What?_" Millerna gasped in shock.

"There are townspeople caught inside the ice giants. He's killing them, and he's not listening to what I'm telling him!"

Before Millerna's mind could pick through what it meant for people to be caught inside giants, Hitomi started to cry out to the air again. "Van! You and Allen need to stop fighting! There are people, Van! There are people inside!"

_Inside?_ Was she still talking about the ice giants? Millerna did not quite understand. What she did understand, however, was that Celena became more restless and agitated as Hitomi's voice grew louder and more frantic. The girl was breathing heavily, her nostrils flaring, and the fabric of her dress was taught between her hands.

"There are people trapped in the ice!"

Millerna's gaze went from Celena to Hitomi, who had one hand stiffly arched over the pendant that dangled from a gold chain around her neck. The jewel caught the light from the oil lamp on the table and gleamed bright red. At first, Millerna thought nothing of it until she realized that the room was a little too dark and the pendant gleamed a little too brightly.

"_There are innocent people in there!_" Hitomi's voice rose in octave and volume.

The sound of something ripping instantly drew Millerna's attention back to Celena, who had torn the entire length of her skirt. One hand clawed at the side of her head, the snow-white hair tumbling between her fingers like long, wispy strands of cotton. She breathed through her teeth, a bubbly hissing, as she rocked back and forth in the chair.

"Please, Van, take Allen and run!" Hitomi almost screamed, shrill and desperate. The pendant in her hand glowed even brighter, bathing the room an eerie red cast.

There was a crash by the fireplace. The chair had overturned, and Celena was on the ground, clutching her head between her hands. A dark line appeared on the right side of her face, drawn from the temple down the cheek, and her fingers seemed thicker and coarser than usual. A tortured wail tore from her throat.

Millerna needed to do something, so she did the only thing she could think of. Grabbing Hitomi's wrist, she yanked her hand away from the pendant and slapped Hitomi hard across the face.

-

In the city, the sirens died away, but the ice remained, a lingering reminder of the horror that had befallen Palas. The monsters crumbled to crystal dust, leaving the frozen bodies of townspeople strewn throughout the city. Most were already dead, but some still barely hung on to life. Others had been killed at the hands of the military's melef operators. Their blood stained the streets and when the people tried to wash it away, the water froze as soon as it touched the ground.

The ice giants did not come again, but more blood spilled with each passing day. People turned on each other as if possessed. The streets rang with the shouts of rioters, and the city was filled with smoke from burning buildings and the bodies of people who had been trampled underfoot. Children screamed for their dead parents, only to be cut down by those who found them. Doomsayers populated street corners and town squares, preaching the wrath of Jeture and the fulfillment of apocalyptic prophecies. After one of the king's closest advisors and his family perished during the night in a blaze that was set by a rogue arsonist, King Aston decided it was time to declare martial law in Palas. Soldiers patrolled the major thoroughfares, their Guymelefs bleak and imposing in a city paralyzed by madness and fear.

It rained. For days it rained, an icy rain that froze to the frigid ground, and when the rain stopped, it snowed. Millerna watched from the windows of the palace as her city was blanketed in cloud and ice, a dark shadow of unease descending over Palas and creeping into her soul. The city of canals had become an arctic maze, lying frozen and silent as if the heart of Asturia wished to weep but could not.


	11. Hitomi's Decision

Author's note: Sorry about leaving you guys hanging last time. I kind of got bored with linear storytelling :P

Shameless plug: I had forgotten to mention this last time...a while back, I started a writing blog that chronicles the writing of this fic (the URL can be found on my profile). I also talk a lot about Escaflowne and writing in general there. Everyone is welcome to stop by and discuss any of those things or even just say hi ;)

-

**The Last Night of the World**

**Chapter 10**

**Hitomi's Decision **

-

After Millerna had slapped her, Hitomi found herself back in the room in the palace. She no longer saw what Van saw or felt what he felt. The force of Millerna's hand, Celena's disconsolate moaning, and Millerna's stern and frightened eyes were burned into her memory. For days, Hitomi dreamed she was holding Van back by the arms or restraining him from behind. Each time, he was impaled by the sword of a hazy, indistinct foe. Each time, she knew it was coming, but her arms would not let go. Sometimes the sword would pierce her too, and her blood would mingle with his. Each time, she would wake up in a cold sweat, her heart leaping out of her chest.

Hitomi avoided Van ever since the hail stopped.She had only meant to warn him about the ice giants. But she had inadvertently paralyzed him and almost got him killed. But that was not the reason why she wanted to hide her face in shame whenever he walked by, refusing to meet her eyes.

She had meddled again, had poked her nose where it didn't belong. She had no right to undermine Van's control of Escaflowne. The bond between him and the dragon armor should not have been treated lightly, and what she did violated whatever trust Van had left in her. She hadn't meant to do it; all she wanted was for him to leave the battle. When he wouldn't listen to her, when he didn't understand what she was saying, she started to panic and found herself somehow moving Escaflowne's legs before she knew what was happening.

Terrified, she had tried to pull back. But it was like her body had been caught in a web, tangled and paralyzed. It was much like what she had felt before, many years ago. _My emotions bind him_, she realized. But this time around, she hadn't been able to let go. She had been afraid.

If it had not been for Millerna, Van would have been pummeled to death. After the giants vanished, Escaflowne had miraculously appeared in the Guymelef enclosure, miles away from the fighting. The dragon armor mercilessly ejected its operator, and Van had been carried to the infirmary, unconscious. Escaflowne had sustained surprisingly minor damage, and Van quickly recovered after it was repaired.

Knowing that Van was safe was enough for Hitomi. That was more important than the coldness that hung between them. She could bear the awkwardness, the guilt, as long as he was all right.

Hitomi spent her days trying to help out where she could. She wanted to relieve some of the burden from the nurses in the infirmary, which was in another part of town. Once, she was caught returning to the palace after curfew and was escorted back by a trio of hard-faced soldiers. They spoke with the palace guards, who banned her from leaving the palace grounds ever again. It was for her own safety, the guards had said. But when her back was turned, when they thought she was out of earshot, she heard them muttering about curses and the Mystic Moon.

By simply looking at her, one could not tell that Hitomi was from a different world. She wore a heavy blue cloak against the cold over a long green dress that hid all but the toes of her soft leather boots. All borrowed from Millerna, of course. She looked the part of an Asturian noble, but even so, people seemed to know who she was.

Maybe it had to do with King Aston and his advisors. They were the only ones in the palace who knew about Hitomi's origins aside from Allen, Dryden, and Millerna. She had faith that Allen and Millerna had enough discretion not to go about spreading their knowledge of her connection to the Mystic Moon. Dryden, with his enthusiasm for the lore of Atlantis, may have let something slip. But for even the palace guards to be whispering rumors? There had to be more than just a slip of the tongue.

The last time she had been on Gaea, during the war, the welcome that she and Van had received from King Aston was less than warm. And when Zaibach demanded that she be handed over, she was a sharp stone that dug into the soft heel of Asturia. Rumors about her recent return to Fanelia had spread all over Gaea, and King Aston was not stupid. Where the king of Fanelia went, the girl from the Mystic Moon went with him. Tragedy had followed her footsteps in the Great War, and now calamity trailed in her wake. Her return was a menace to Gaea and to Asturia.

Hitomi couldn't really blame King Aston for being leery of her. There were many nights when she would lie in her bed, staring up at the canopy, wondering if she actually was reason why these disasters were happening. It was different from the time during the war. Events had already been set in motion by the time she had arrived, and her power was to influence the course of the future with her emotions. But this time, she had arrived in times of peace. There was no war. Gaea was recovering, and the nations were getting back on their feet.

So what reason did her mind have to dream up catastrophe for Gaea? Unnatural, unexplainable catastrophe? It didn't make sense. She had the power to influence events, but whatever misgivings she might feel about returning to Gaea didn't give her the power to create rifts in the earth or cover a city in ice. Even so, she knew she must have had something to do with all the disasters afflicting this world, because they had started from the moment of her arrival.

When she first returned to Gaea, it was like coming home, like slipping on an old life. The two moons were no longer a strange sight, but old friends. Beast people did not startle her anymore, and palaces and horse-drawn carriages were a part of normal, everyday life.

She thought she could belong in Gaea, in Fanelia. She thought she could help heal the wounds of the kingdom whose destiny had once been so entwined with her own. She thought that was reason why she had been brought back—to help Fanelia, to help Van. Her visions had saved hundreds of people from perishing at the claws of the dragons, and she saved Clara and Van from the river of fire. Her visions were helping. That was what she wanted to believe.

But when horror and ice descended on Palas, nothing made sense anymore. The screams of people dying in the streets seemed to accuse her of bringing the madness upon them. Nobles and servants in the palace whispered among themselves about the Mystic Moon and avoided her. And she and Van might as well be strangers.

Hitomi realized that it was selfish and conceited of her to think that Gaea could ever be her world.

But she didn't know what to do. She needed to talk to someone about it.

So one day, she found herself in front of the door to Millerna's study. Of the people she had befriended on Gaea, she felt closest to Millerna. Maybe it was because she had shared in Millerna's struggles with Allen, and their former rivalry had somehow brought them to a mutual understanding. And Millerna was also the only other female, since talking to Merle was out of the question.

Hitomi knocked, and Millerna answered the door wearing a maroon shawl wrapped snugly around her shoulders and head. Wispy locks of pale hair peeked out from under the cloth. The shawl matched her ruffled cream and chestnut dress, and the combination was quite becoming. "Hitomi?"

"Millerna…I need to talk to you."

Millerna took one look at Hitomi's face and ushered her inside. Her study was a small room, with a wide desk by the window and two cushioned chairs set at angles in front of it. The other half of the room was covered with bookshelves and a stout stepping stool sat in the corner. Millerna settled into one of the chairs, and Hitomi sat down across from her.

"What's the matter, Hitomi?"

Hitomi twisted her fingers around each other. "Millerna…if you really liked someone, but you knew that it would be better for you to stay away, what would you do?"

The other woman shot a piercing gaze at her. "Are you talking about Van?"

Despite herself, Hitomi reddened. That had come out entirely the wrong way. She had been referring to Gaea, not Van. "No, no, I'm talking about…"

Millerna was perched on the edge of her chair, waiting intently. How could Hitomi tell Millerna that she was the reason why her city was covered in blood and ice? That the curse of the Mystic Moon was more than just an old wives' tale?

"…about…" she faltered.

"Your fiancé?" Millerna guessed.

Hitomi sat in silence. What should she say?

Millerna reached forward and covered Hitomi's hands. Hitomi had twisted her fingers into a knot. "It's all right. You don't have to tell me if you don't want to," she said sympathetically.

The princess stood up and walked to the window by the desk, which looked out over the palace walls. The edge of the shawl draped down her back, hiding her unruly mane of blond hair. She stood with her back to Hitomi and pulled her shawl closer around her. "If I really liked someone, but I knew that it might be better if I stayed away, what would I do?" she said, echoing Hitomi's question.

Hitomi could not see her face, but the tone of Millerna's voice made her think that the princess might be talking about herself. "Millerna?"

"Sometimes I think it will be all right if I stay with him. But other times, neither of us is happy." Millerna sighed, a drooping of her shoulders. "I don't know what's right anymore."

_Allen…she must be talking about Allen. And Celena. _"You'll know what to do when the time comes, Millerna," Hitomi protested. "You always do."

The other woman only looked at her. Hitomi felt like she was caught in the middle of telling a bold-faced lie. Maybe she shouldn't have said that. Was she giving her false hope? Did Millerna really know the right thing to do, when it came down to it? Did any of them?

"Do you really think so?" Millerna said.

Her grandmother's words whispered to Hitomi in the back of her mind. _"Believe in them…believe in the people you love."_

_Believe in them… _Hitomi nodded with what she hoped was confidence. "Yes. Because that's the kind of person you are."

Millerna walked over and hugged her wordlessly. Hitomi hugged her back, her fingers getting lost in the folds of the shawl and strands of silky hair.

"Thank you, Hitomi," Millerna finally said. "You will know what to do, too. I know you will."

-

Hitomi took a few steps down the hall and stopped to lean her head against the wooden molding of the wall. The unexpected mention of Van in her conversation with Millerna had unnerved her. She had wanted to talk about Gaea, not Van. But somehow he had crept in there. And they hadn't really talked about Gaea, in the end. She shook her head, trying to clear him from her thoughts. How she felt about him wasn't important right now, and besides, she was not even sure how he felt about her anymore. Remembering their few frigid encounters in the last weeks, she did not really want to find out.

Despite Millerna's encouragement, Hitomi felt even more alone than before. She just could not bring herself to tell Millerna the truth about her visions. And if she couldn't tell Millerna, who could she tell?

Hitomi spent the rest of the afternoon wandering through the palace, walking along the frozen courtyards, away from the people she knew and away from the people she didn't know, who spoke in whispers and looked at her slantwise.

She entered a corridor in one of the far wings of the palace. It was empty and did not seem as well-traveled as the hallways she had just left: the carved wooden inlays of the walls were a little dustier, and the carpet was a little older. Three doors at the end of the hall grinned at her like wooden teeth. Several windows lined one wall, affording a view of the royal forest and hunting grounds. The snow had come in the middle of summer, so the trees had not had the chance to lose their leaves yet. Their trunks bowed under the weight of ice and snow like withered old men.

The Earth and the Moon had risen early, and they watched her like silent sentinels in the cold crystal sky. She wondered what Yutaro was doing. She wondered if it was nighttime and he was sitting in his living room with a mug of tea, unable to sleep. Or maybe it was morning, and he had just woken up and was washing up at the sink, the cool scent of shaving cream filling the bathroom, his feet leaving pale prints in the blue rectangular rug.

Now that Hitomi was no longer constantly in Van's company, she had started thinking more about Yutaro. She realized how much she missed him. Every tall, lanky figure with golden-brown hair was Yutaro until she saw the face. She kept hearing snippets of her named being called in his voice. The sound of his footsteps tugged at her ears, and she would turn around to find that she was the only one there.

Yutaro was the only person who seemed to truly understand her without knowing every detail of her life. He knew what it meant to live your life while wanting more than what you already had. _Everyone wants more out of life_, he once said. _Some people are just more aware of it than others._ Yutaro wanted to believe the mysterious and discover the beautiful, and Hitomi wanted to join him.

He made her feel that she was mysterious and that she was beautiful. She stopped dreaming about Gaea and Van because the world she now lived in was exciting and was waiting to be explored. And there was someone who wanted to explore it with her.

But when Hitomi saw the feather in the window of the china shop, the life she had built on Earth shuddered on its foundations. Why did it remind her so strongly of Van? Was it because the imprint of the feather was so simple and pure on the stark porcelain? Why that moment, when everything in her life had been going so well?

And then she had arrived in Fanelia. It became difficult to separate the past from the present; she was seventeen again and Gaea was a world of wonders. It was like returning to a dream, and it was as if she had never left.

But she _had_ left, and she was no longer seventeen. She was as good as married, but she found herself taking Van's hand as he gazed forlornly on the ruins of Fanelia. It was just supposed to be a gesture of friendship, but the next thing she knew, they were holding hands and kissing.

It was as if something had awakened, a part of her that had been slumbering deep below the surface. Even after Hitomi told Van about her engagement, she still let herself be carried by her affections. It was easy to forget about Earth for a while when Gaea was all around her and Van was all she could see.

But it wasn't fair to Yutaro. It wasn't fair to Van, either. When she was at home with Yutaro, away from Van, she didn't think much about Van. When she was in Gaea with Van, away from Yutaro, she didn't think much about Yutaro. But now, she wasn't with anyone and she was in a world where she did not belong.

Hitomi brought her hand out from under the cloak, the one that bore the ring. It was still on her right hand, but she had not taken it off, either. The gold band was cool and hugged her finger in the chilly air. The ring looked wrong on her hand, the mirror image of what it was supposed to be. It was caught in between two choices, just as Hitomi was.

Things could not remain this way forever. Her indecision wore away at her soul and tormented her relationship with Van. Earth or Gaea, Van or Yutaro. She had to pick one.

Hitomi had not been able to take the ring off while she was still on Gaea. As she studied the three diamond crystals, she realized that she, by not acting, had made her choice long ago without even knowing it. And now her decision was being reinforced by the rumblings of Gaea itself. Resolve settled through her, a stone settling on the bottom of a lake.

Her life on Gaea had been a dream, even if it was a dream that had turned sour. And as with all dreams, this one had to eventually come to an end.


	12. The Mystery of Atlantis

**The Last Night of the World**

**Chapter 11**

**The Mystery of Atlantis**

-

Allen Schezar was frustrated. It had been three weeks since the hail came, and still he did not know what King Aston or his advisors planned to do about Palas. He did not know who they suspected was behind all this, if there was anyone to suspect. He did not know what King Aston was thinking, except that the king's mistrust of the knight seemed to have grown even deeper.

The stilted relationship between the king of Asturia and the young Knight of Caeli had been years in the breaking. King Aston never seemed to care for the fact that the twelfth and final recruit had once been an undisciplined, orphaned rogue. The first seeds of his displeasure were sown when Allen began to spend more and more time alone with his eldest daughter. Then Marlene was married off to the duke of Freid. Allen did not know what Aston suspected about him and Marlene, but he didn't have to wonder for long. After Chid was born, Allen began to be assigned the more mundane tasks and was always last to be named when Aston bestowed royal favor on the Caeli knights. People had always attributed Chid's pale skin and sun-bleached hair to Marlene's fair features, but those who also knew Allen might have noticed that the prince and the knight shared the same blue eyes. The years passed; Allen had his missions, Marlene had her duties. When Allen set foot in Freid for the first time, it was on the morning of Marlene's funeral. The mild spring day as he stood in front of her headstone would remain in his memory forever, the forget-me-nots in his hand wilting in the rain-kissed air.

Aside from Marlene, the princess Eries had been his only friend in the palace. But once Eries returned from visiting her baby nephew in Freid, her eyes had turned colder than the winter sky. Her smile—a wry quirking of her lips reserved only for those close to her—slowly faded until it disappeared altogether. On the other hand, the boisterous Millerna outgrew her knobby legs and short skirts, and everything about her began to remind Allen of Marlene. As Eries distanced herself from Allen, Millerna's blossoming interest in him surpassed a princess's concern for her knight. She grew more coy with each passing year, and Allen's missions became increasingly remote until he was finally assigned to an outpost on the border. That way, the king ensured that Allen only returned to Palas to report any major happenings. Which was not very often.

The princess was at a more than marriageable age now, and King Aston was not growing any younger. The longer she remained interested in Allen, the less likely she was to marry Dryden, or so Aston seemed to think. Ever since the war ended, the king had assigned Allen to patrol duty in the province surrounding Palas. It was close enough to the city that Allen could be called back immediately if necessary—a grudging admission of Aston's reliance on Allen's prowess—but far enough for Aston's peace of mind.

Aston's foresight had not been in vain. Now that disaster had struck Palas, the king wanted all twelve Knights of Caeli in the capital. In times of martial law, each knight commanded a patrol of men that regulated different sectors of the city. To his surprise, Allen had been allowed to retain his own crew of men in addition to the regiment that had been assigned to him. But he knew better than to question this unexpected boon; favors like this from the king were rare, and he could not afford to take them for granted.

In order to lead a team of soldiers, however, Allen needed direction. He needed to know what the king's goals were and what he was thinking. But the only directive he had received was to keep the peace in the southeast quarter of the Palas. He was able to glean bits and pieces from his fellow knights, who were oddly tight-lipped with their information. But what made him bitter was that he had to rely on Van, who received reports from Fanelia's head of intelligence, to find out what his own king was planning. Allen had to swallow his dignity and ask Van about the goings-on in the palace, pretending that he already knew where matters stood and was merely looking for an outlet to discuss his opinions. If Van saw through his façade, he didn't show it, which suited Allen just fine.

Allen had just given this week's report to the man standing in for General Saranoff, a beak-nosed fellow who clearly had better things to do than to deal with a knight who had fallen out of the king's favor. As usual, Allen received little more than a curt nod of dismissal in return. Now he was to return to his post and mind the industrial sector, a section of the city which had been all but deserted since the hail. It was a mind-numbing assignment, made even more so by being kept in the dark by King Aston.

The tall knight covered the palace grounds in calm strides that belied his inner tension. He had to go home to Celena. The day was hardly over, but he needed to see his sister, to know how she was doing. Celena was one of the few things that kept him grounded when nothing else around him made sense. To have recovered a part of his life that he once thought was lost forever, to know that Celena—after having her identity and memory ripped away from her—was still Celena, his heart was at peace. When her eyes, blue as ice, warmed at the sight of him, he was home.

Allen was so wrapped up in his own thoughts that he didn't notice Hitomi until he almost walked right into her. She suddenly appeared in front of him as he was turning the corner.

"Allen!" she exclaimed, stopping abruptly in her tracks. "I'm sorry, I didn't see you."

"Hitomi," he said, taking a graceful step back and bowing. "This is an unexpected surprise." He noticed that she was coming from the north wing of the palace, an older section of the building that was little-used except by lesser dignitaries when the other meeting rooms and studies had filled up. "What brings you to this part of the palace?"

Hitomi's eyes darted to the side before she answered. She was twisting something around a finger on her left hand. "Allen, do you know where Van might be?"

Something gleamed metallically under her thumb, and he understood. "The last I heard, Dryden wanted to talk to him about something. They're probably meeting in one of the conference rooms. I can take you there."

They walked side by side, neither one saying much. Hitomi's head was bowed, but she was no longer fidgeting with her ring. Five years had changed her: she had lost the cheerful and carefree spirit that Allen had fallen in love with so long ago. Or maybe it was not the years, but the circumstances.

For some reason, he thought of Millerna. The princess had changed, too. And so had he. How could they not? It had been five years.

But Hitomi had the courage to do what he and Millerna could not. It was easier for him and the princess to hold on to what they had, even when what they had was slowly suffocating them both. "So long as your heart is at peace, you have done the right thing," he said.

Hitomi quickly glanced up at Allen, her green irises transparent and questioning. "Allen?"

"'_Do what is right and serve what is true_,'" he said. "That is the motto we Knights of Caeli live by. We are only human, so we don't always succeed. But we try."

Allen was really talking to himself now, but Hitomi seemed to take his words to heart. She nodded resolutely. "I will try, as well."

-

"You want me to go to Basram with you?" Van said with mild annoyance and disbelief.

Dryden Fassa stood across the table from Van and Wellyn in the meeting room they had borrowed. It was not as cold as the rest of the palace, probably better insulated because the cluster of rooms it belonged to was used by higher ranking officials and even the king himself. But Wellyn doubted that Asturia saw the kind of winters that Fanelia did. Even though he was indoors, the chill still clung to his fingers inside his gloves. His high-necked coat of thick Fanelian wool was the only reason why Wellyn wasn't shivering like the Asturian nobles in their jackets adorned with tassels and embroidery that passed for winter coats. Merle had found it for him last week in one of the few shops that remained open in Palas and had obtained a similar one for Van.

The merchant pushed his spectacles up the bridge of his nose and sat on the edge of the heavy cherrywood table. "Yes. With your Draconian heritage, you would be a great help."

"I cannot leave my people," Van protested. "My duty is here, to them. I can't go chasing after something that's just a theory."

Their conversation was interrupted by a knock on the door. They turned as the door swung open to admit two newcomers. One was a man with a mane of long blond hair, a soldier of high rank from the engraved hilt of the sword at his waist. The other was the girl from the Mystic Moon, who looked as though she wanted to hide inside the dark blue cloak that was bundled around her shoulders. When Van met Hitomi's eyes, he quickly looked away.

"Allen, Hitomi," Dryden welcomed them. "I was just discussing something with Van and Wellyn that might interest you."

"Please excuse the intrusion," Allen said. Now Wellyn remembered who he was—the knight from Asturia who had helped facilitate Fanelia's evacuation. "Van, Hitomi would like to have a word with you."

Van's chair scraped across the floor as he slowly stood up, still avoiding Hitomi's eyes. In his five years of service, Wellyn had never seen Van so deeply affected by another person. Hitomi was rather pretty, and Wellyn supposed she was a nice person—she had lent a hand to the medics in Fanelia, after all—but every nice and pretty girl did not make Van act this way. Like he had so many times before, Wellyn wondered what it was about the girl from the Mystic Moon that could unsettle his king like this.

"No, it's all right," Hitomi said with a shake of her head, braids the color of wheat swaying from side to side. "I think this is something everyone needs to hear."

Something they needed to hear? When a woman said she needed to talk, it usually wasn't about something that she wanted to announce to a room full of people.

She nervously laced her fingers together and took a deep breath. "You see…I'm the reason why all this is happening."

The room fell quiet. Van was looking at Hitomi now, probably without realizing it. Wellyn's chair creaked as he leaned forward. "All what?" he inquired.

"Everything. The destruction of Fanelia, the dragons, and now Palas."

Wellyn narrowed his eyes. Was that what she really believed? She could predict the future, that was true, and she was also from the Mystic Moon, the land of curses and mystery. But what made her think she could control the forces of nature? Were the rumors true after all?

"That's impossible," Allen said, voicing Wellyn's thoughts. "You are no more to blame than the rest of us."

"No!" Hitomi protested so forcefully that Allen gave a start of surprise. "My visions are not just visions. I don't really know why, but I have the power of Atlantis. My feelings become reality. I can't control them, so that's why my visions always predict disaster. The same thing happened during the war. That's why I left."

The power of Atlantis. The fabled power that was said to have driven the war and dissolved the alliance. Wellyn had watched the war from the sidelines, clinging to every piece of news that passed through the lips of the travelers he encountered. He had had to scrape his way to survival during that time, as did his fellow countrymen, finding shelter in abandoned farmhouses and living off the scant offerings of the forest. Without water or a horse, he had not been able to travel far. He hungered for food and information, and occasionally he would encounter a kind merchant who provided him with both. People spoke of Zaibach's latest intrigues and the destruction of Freid, but more than anything, Wellyn wanted to know if his king was still alive. As long as Fanelia's king survived, the prospect of reuniting the kingdom still existed. If Van survived, then Fanelia still had Escaflowne, and Escaflowne might triumph over Zaibach.

Against all odds, Van had made it out alive, and so had Wellyn. The incomprehensible workings of fate had crossed their paths, and Wellyn soon found himself at Van's right hand. By the time he was appointed the head of Technological Research and Development, Hitomi had already gone. Zaibach had lost the war because the emperor had been betrayed by his own Strategos and their most fearsome melef operator had been slain by the king of Fanelia himself. Basram had dealt the finishing blow with their frightening new weapon, which threw the armies into chaos and confusion until their generals came to their senses. Reports of a white dragon flying through the sky and an eerie emerald light emanating from Zaibach's capital were discounted as the delirious fancies of shell-shocked soldiers. So in the end, the girl from the Mystic Moon was little more than a rumor and the power of Atlantis nothing more than a myth.

But legend and myth fueled Wellyn's dreams, and they were what he lived for. And now the legend was living and breathing and standing in front of him.

Allen did not seem to know what to say, and Dryden was thoughtfully stroking his chin. Wellyn carefully watched Van, who was studying the wood grain on the table in front of him. "Van-sama, is this true?"

Van's expression was stony and unreadable. "It's true," he said. "That's why she left."

"And that's why she has to leave again," Wellyn concluded. He understood her anxiousness now and why Van had suddenly closed up. "That's what she came here to tell you." He fixed his gaze on Hitomi. "Isn't it?"

Hitomi shifted uncomfortably and did not answer. "I'll take you back," Van announced and walked past her to the door.

"Before you do that, King Van," Dryden said and held up one hand, "let me propose something. I think we may have found the key to the puzzle."

That made Van pause. Wellyn thought he knew where this was going, but he crossed his arms over his chest. "Elaborate."

"I think we'll all agree that none of these disasters are natural, although they may appear so at first glance. There are only a few possible explanations: an organization or nation with powerful magic on their side, a vengeful god, or the mystery of Atlantis. Personally, I favor the Atlantis theory."

"It's the one with the most evidence behind it," Wellyn agreed. He had heard from Dryden the stories about their journey to Atlantis. "Unless Dryden is a liar, Atlantis really exists and everyone in this room has been there except for me."

"But the power of Atlantis is the whole reason why I can't stay," Hitomi said, visibly distressed. "I have to leave, or Gaea will perish."

"I'm not so sure," Dryden mused. He rose from the edge of the table and paced across the room. "Somehow, I get the feeling that there's more to this than just your power, Hitomi. What's happening here is of apocalyptic proportions, which is what makes me think of Atlantis."

"Are you saying that Gaea is becoming like Atlantis?" Allen said, concern beginning to filter through his calm demeanor.

"Some of the events certainly mirror Atlantis's demise. The splitting of the earth, the terror overtaking Palas. But I need to find out more before I can really say. With her ability to see the past, Hitomi may be able to help us get to the bottom of this."

Van whirled around and approached Dryden. His hands had curled into fists. "It's Hitomi's decision," he said firmly. Van stared him down, daring the merchant to contradict him.

But Dryden only waved his hand in dismissal, unperturbed. "Of course, of course. I'm not forcing her to stay. But I think she could help us tremendously if she stayed a little longer."

"Do you really think so?" Hitomi asked in a small voice.

"You were the key to Gaea's salvation during the war. You could save us once again."

"I…" she began, and hesitated. "What if things only get worse?"

"So what if they do? The question we should really be asking is: what if things get worse after you leave? Then we'll never know what might have happened if you had stayed."

Hitomi bit her lip, torn by her resolve and Dryden's persuasion. The air was heavy as everyone waited for her answer.

"Hitomi," Van said suddenly. He stepped in front of her and faced her for the first time. "It's your decision."

Something passed between them. Van's back was to him, but Wellyn could tell it from the way Hitomi's fingers relaxed and her posture softened. It made him wonder. Wellyn had known Van long enough to know how obstinate his moods could be. What was it about Hitomi that could make Van shed his shell of indifference? What was she to him?

"I'll stay, then," Hitomi decided at last. "I'll stay until you find out what you need."

Dryden clapped his hands and rubbed them together, a merchant who had just closed a deal. "Excellent. We should depart for Basram without any further delay."

"Basram?" Hitomi said quizzically.

"Basram has one of the most extensive collections of ancient texts in the world, and it used to be second only to Freid," Wellyn said. "But many of Freid's libraries burned down during the war, so Basram currently has the best resources."

"I need to delve into the history and legends of Atlantis in order to understand how we are connected to that ancient world," Dryden explained. "I was hoping you would come with us. Your ability to read the ancient tongue could prove to be most useful."

"All right," Hitomi said, determined, but Wellyn thought she seemed a little pale.

"You should come with us, Van," Dryden said. He peered at Van over the rim of his spectacles as if to gauge the king's reaction. "We could use your help. You, too, Wellyn. Your expertise in this matter far surpasses mine."

"My people need me," Van answered. "I cannot leave them."

"Van-sama, as long as Fanelia's people are in Asturia, they are in good hands," Wellyn pointed out. "It will only be a few days, at most. Doradeen and the others can manage for a while without you."

Van did not reply. Wellyn recalled Garva's concerns during one of their meetings earlier in the day: Basram, the most technologically advanced nation next to Zaibach, had been secretive about their military maneuvers recently. "Basram has also been acting strangely," he reminded Van. "It may not be a bad idea to keep an eye on them for a few days and see for ourselves."

At last, Van acquiesced. When Allen included himself in the plans for departure, no one objected. In fact, they acted as if they expected him to come along. By now, Wellyn realized that there were complex undercurrents of an untold story that tied the lives of everyone in the room together. They were to leave the next morning for Basram aboard one of Dryden's leviships. The journey to discover the secrets of Atlantis was about to begin.


	13. Behind the Mask

Author's Note: Jeture is the sea god of Asturia.

-

**The Last Night of the World**

**Chapter 12**

**Behind the Mask**

-

As his youngest daughter requested what he wished for and dreaded the most, Grava Aston wondered for the hundredth time why Jeture had chosen to bless him with three daughters.

When Marlene was first born, Aston had not been worried. Therese was still young and would bear him many more children. Next came Eries, whose manner was serious and unflappable, even in childhood. Four years later, Aston watched with barely contained eagerness as his third child made its way into the world. Excitement faded to disappointment when the midwife announced that the child was female. Disappointment turned to gut-wrenching fear when his wife cried out in pain and the sheets began to bleed.

After Therese's death, Aston's three girls became the apple of his eye. Eries resembled her mother the most in appearance, but Marlene had Therese's mysterious smile and quiet grace. Love them as he might, he never understood them. Marlene became more and more secretive when the youngest knight of Caeli showed up in the palace. Eries had been secretive to begin with. Only Millerna was bubbly and open, reminding him of his youthful days that were once as golden as the curls gracing the crown of her head. She was headstrong, too, fiery and capricious and often clashing wills with him. Perhaps he loved her so much because she was exactly the way he used to be, or because she embodied Therese's last moments on Gaea, the precious life that Therese had given herself up to create.

Having only daughters wreaked havoc with Aston's life and with his political designs. Although he played the part of the aloof but concerned father, he was not blind to the way Marlene looked at Allen Schezar. Nor did he fail to notice that Chid bore no resemblance to the dark-skinned Mahad dar Freid. He felt himself age another ten years when Eries declared her refusal to marry and donned the demure dress of the nuns of Jeture. So his hopes for the succession of the kingdom lay on the shoulders of his youngest daughter, who was still infatuated with the knight who had nearly destroyed Marlene's happiness.

Now Millerna was asking for his permission to accompany Dryden Fassa to Chavant, the capital of Basram. But both of them knew what she was really asking. Earlier that morning, Allen had come to him with the exact same request. Aston had granted his wish, glad to have the man out of his sight and out of his hair. However, things did not go as smoothly as he had planned. Millerna had not mentioned the blond knight, but she did not need to. It was no coincidence.

But they had played this game many times before. When Millerna wanted something he would not approve of, she dressed it up with words to draw his attention elsewhere. Aston would then pry a little deeper with careful questions, which she dodged with a skill that had been cultivated by the years.

Aston tapped a ring-laden finger to his cheek. "You've never wanted to have anything to do with Dryden before. Why change your mind now?"

When Millerna answered, she looked him in the eye, unwavering. "I am engaged to him, but I hardly know him at all. And he has been gone for five years. This will give me the chance to see what kind of a man he is."

"You had the chance to see what kind of a man he was during the war. Was that not enough?"

"He left to live among the people afterwards. People change, Father."

What she said was true. Millerna no longer ran about with children of the palace servants, and she carried herself with more grace than she had as a teenager. Her impetuousness was now tempered by level-headed reasoning and calm discussion. Five years could change people, and they had changed his undisciplined tomboy of a daughter into a woman. But even though she was asking for Aston's permission, her mouth was set and her gray eyes were willful.

"They don't change that much," he replied.

A flash of indignation crossed her face at his blunt statement. She was still the same despite her veneer of aristocratic diplomacy. Millerna might be able to fool others, but she could not fool her father.

"People change more than you think, Father. Their feelings change, too. My feelings have changed."

Aston was not prepared for this reply. Her feelings had changed? What did she mean? She was clearly still in love with Allen; they acted as if they were practically married and that Celena was their child. Could she mean she'd realized that being with Allen was not as idyllic as she imagined it would be? Or that the mysterious allure of a rich, handsome man only grew stronger with distance and time?

"Dryden gave me the choice of making up my own mind," she said. "Because of that, I think he deserves a second chance."

Dryden deserved a second chance? Obviously, Millerna didn't realize that she was the one who had been given the second chance. And somehow she had gotten the idea that she had a choice in the matter. She still did not understand the price of duty that came with being born into a royal station. But since their marriage had never been consummated and had been suspended by Dryden himself, Aston supposed she did have a choice now. Or at least Aston had lost what influence he had left.

If Dryden had not let her go, it would have been different. He shouldn't have let her go so easily. It was an opportunity that might never come again—Dryden clearly did not know flighty Millerna could be. The plan that Aston had carefully concocted with Meiden was now unexpectedly out of his hands. Well, he supposed that this was what happened when children grew up and developed minds of their own. And if he denied Millerna her request, she was going to find a way to go anyway. If he gave her his blessing, at least he would know where she was and wouldn't have to worry.

"All right. You may go to Basram with Dryden."

"Thank you, Father."

But he could not let her go without reminding her of his expectation for her engagement. "And do not forget: the two of you will be representing Asturia as her future king and queen."

Millerna answered without missing a beat. "Yes, Father."

-

Although it was the largest of Dryden's fleet of merchant ships, the _Ariel_ was a small craft. A small but opulent craft. Hitomi fingered the ivory lining one of the rounded windows and wondered if the leviship had been a recent purchase. Dryden had sold his entire convoy during the war. And then he went to live with the common folk. But didn't buying leviships with ivory windows negate the whole point of trying to understand the lives of normal people?

She shouldn't jump to conclusions so quickly. Maybe he owned this ship before the war started. He came from a very wealthy family, after all. But the _Ariel_ was another piece that didn't quite seem to fit the puzzle that was Dryden Fassa. Hitomi never understood him, and she wondered if anyone really did.

This was the first time that everyone was together in the same place again. When she heard that Millerna would be joining them, Hitomi was delighted. It would be like the old days again, when they were united against a common enemy and life was a little less complicated.

But it wasn't the same. She should have known that from the start. Allen and Millerna had the feel of a couple who had been together for so long that they had forgotten why they were together in the first place. Even when they were apart, Millerna's sunny manner was subdued and the awkward air of ex-lovers hung between Hitomi and Allen. Merle was an implacable bundle of resentment. Although Hitomi thought something had changed in the meeting room in Palas, she still couldn't penetrate Van's icy armor. In the end, nothing was the same. When the faces were familiar but the people acted like strangers, it was that much harder to bear.

Hitomi found herself spending much of her time with Celena. She did not know Celena well, having only seen her in Allen's company on occasion before she returned home. The girl behaved like a ghost and made Hitomi uncomfortable, but keeping her company meant that Millerna and Allen would not have to, and it eased the tension between all of them. It was the least Hitomi could do. Her return to Gaea had stirred up old anxieties and worries, and while the strain was most obvious between her and Van, the effect on Millerna and Allen was not small. Allen's declaration of love for Hitomi was a thing of the past, but Allen had not asked Millerna to marry him. The air between Millerna and Hitomi was noticeably cooler when Allen was there, too. So Hitomi stayed with Celena.

The middle deck of the _Ariel _was two large rooms separated by a narrow hallway. On one end was the steering deck, from where the raucous laughter and shouts of the pilots escaped into the hall. The two women occupied the other end of the ship, which was paneled with windows that reached from the ceiling to the floor. There, they could watch the land below them roll by as the clouds escorted them through the sky. Allen had brought several books to occupy Celena, who alternated between idly flipping through the pages and staring off into space. He kept them company for a while, telling stories about his ascension to knighthood and his life in Asturia, meant more for Celena's ears than anything else. Hitomi suspected Celena had heard most of these stories already, but the brother and sister seemed to gain a sense of comfort just from being in the same room together and listening to the other's voice. It had been five years since Celena returned, but five years did not make up for the lifetime they had lost.

When Allen left to find Millerna, Hitomi was alone with Celena, the muffled humming of the ship's engines forming a wall of sound between them and the steering room. A spiral staircase intersected the level, leading up to the open-air deck or down to the sleeping quarters and engine room. Hanging on the walls was the evidence of Dryden's travels: feathered charms of leather and fur, beads of glass and gems strung together in a mind-twisting pattern. But what caught Hitomi's eye was a column of masks. They lined the section of wall that divided the vast windows at their end of the ship. Their eyes protruded, eggshells of red and yellow and green with clown mouths that grinned or sighed or frowned. They reminded Hitomi of the ritual Japanese masks that used to hang in her grandfather's living room. Her grandfather had been an avid collector of the pieces of Japanese history that had been left by the wayside of the ages. _It's like having a piece of someone else's life_, he'd said. _You never know what you're going to find._

Their painted faces frightened her as a child. Even when she was more grown up, they made her squeamish. Their painted pupils followed her around and the wide, grimacing mouths were ready to devour her once her back was turned. Whose faces did they hide? Who would want to masquerade as a creature from the demon world? When she and Mamoru were little, Mamoru used to chase her around with one until their mother gave them both a tongue-thrashing about crashing recklessly through a room full of antiques.

The masks stood on the wall across from her and Celena. Three velvet armchairs were arranged in a semicircle around a small coffee table facing the windows. Celena occupied the chair in the middle, her pale face bent as she studied the book in her lap. Now that Allen was gone, Hitomi observed her uneasily. Celena had the smooth-cheeked elegance that Hitomi remembered so well in Dilandau, but she lacked the rabid mania that had characterized Folken's right-hand man. In fact, she lacked any emotion at all. She was not sure which one was worse: Celena when she was calm or Celena when she was disturbed. She remembered how Celena had whimpered and clawed at her face during the attack on Palas. Now, despite her placidity, it was only a matter of time before her porcelain face cracked again and the monster came crawling out.

But Celena was sufficiently occupied, so it was best to leave well enough alone. They flew through a cluster of low-hanging clouds, the cottony mist swimming in their wake. They broke out into open air again, and two moons—one small and pale, the other deep oceanic blue—came into view in the afternoon sky. Hitomi was suddenly choked by a wave of homesickness. Earth looked so lonely. It hung in the featureless sky with only the small, silent moon to keep it company. She was supposed to go to a concert at the park with Yukari at the end of July. It was already late August by now. Yukari must have waited forever by the ice cream vendor before she finally left. There were probably a hundred messages piled up in her voicemail. Yutaro must be worried out of his mind, too. They had planned to spend the summer house-hunting, their trips dotted with excursions to estates in the countryside that they could pretend they would one day own. What was supposed to be a bright and happy time in her life had been cut short by the hauntings of her past. There was only fear and sadness, now, in both worlds.

The room was not cold, but Hitomi curled her legs beneath her and hugged herself. She wanted to see them again, Yutaro and Yukari. Her fingers instinctively reached for the purse she wore at her hip, but they only closed around air. Meager hope crumbled into disappointment. Their pictures were in her wallet, the few remnants of the life she had come from, and now they were gone. The sense of loss emptied Hitomi of anything else.

Where could her purse be? She had it with her when she boarded the _Ariel_. Maybe she left it somewhere by accident. She should go look for it. When she stood up, she realized that going to look for her purse would mean leaving Celena unattended. She vacillated between finding Allen and staying. She didn't want to bother Allen, but her spirits were so heavy that they threatened to drown her. She needed to see their faces again.

But she never had the chance to decide. "Hitomi!" Millerna's voice called, and the heels of her boots echoed across the wooden floorboards. As Hitomi turned at the sound her name, the floor lurched beneath her feet. There was a frightened cry as someone tumbled behind her. The world tilted, and she met the ground with a sharp pain through her hip and elbow. She pushed herself up, but the floor rolled under her again. The hangings on the walls tinkled and clattered as the leviship bobbed through the air. Furniture crowded together and slid away. Celena had fallen out of her chair and her head weaved drunkenly back and forth. The floor swelled again, making Hitomi's stomach lurch. The sudden cacophony of shattering glass made her jump. She looked up and saw that the glass had not been broken after all; the line of masks had fallen on the floor and had smashed like clay pots. The exposed edges were rough and sienna red. They were made of clay after all.

Some of the pieces had skittered close to Celena, who picked one up in her hand. It was the broken upper half of a face, a cobalt blue eye with a bold, thick eyebrow and two stained yellow cubes for teeth. Celena stared back at the eye and her shoulders began to shake. A ragged sob escaped her and she curled up. Hitomi dragged herself across the floor, her legs slipping and sliding as the ship struggled to right itself.

With a loud cry, Celena raised her hand and smashed the mask into the wooden planks. A jagged piece of clay remained in Celena's fist and a line of scarlet flowed down her arm. Hitomi hesitated, her hand caught in midair. Celena's cries climbed in pitch and volume, sirens of distress. Heedless of the girl's wails and bloodied hand, Hitomi crawled closer. She put her arms around Celena, whose thin body rattled so fiercely that Hitomi feared she would fall apart.

It seemed the leviship would never stop its violent rocking, but when it did, Celena's cries quieted to soft whimpers. Hitomi soothingly stroked her shoulder, which eventually ceased its quaking. She drew herself up off the floor, but something tugged on her. Celena's hand was clinging tightly to her dress, blood leaking onto the yellow fabric from a deep gash by her thumb. Hitomi gently loosened the girl's fingers, which automatically curled around Hitomi's hand. Celena's breath came in shudders, and Hitomi held her hand until her red-rimmed eyes were no longer wide and her fingers lost their tension.

Millerna came up behind them, shuffling on her hands and knees, as if standing would be too difficult. "Hitomi, are you all right?" she asked. On seeing the blood staining Hitomi's dress, she gasped. "Are you hurt?"

Hitomi shook her head. "No, I'm fine. Celena cut her hand, though."

The princess gingerly picked up Celena's hand as if she were afraid it might bite her. Celena, who still lay on the ground, watched Millerna calmly as she examined the wound. "This will need stitches," Millerna announced. Then, as if noticing Celena for the first time, she said, with a little more sympathy, "Does it hurt?"

Maybe Celena wasn't used to having so many people concerned about her, or maybe she had never really been acknowledged by anyone else until now, because her eyes were no longer distant and there was a faint warmth to her ivory cheeks that had not been there before. She nodded, pale wisps of hair falling over her face. "Just a little," she whispered.

"I brought my medical bag with me. There's a suture kit in there." Millerna rose to stand. "I'll be right back."

"Wait, Millerna." Hitomi stopped her with a hand on her arm. Millerna had come to look for her right before the ship went out of control. Maybe she had wanted to warn them about something. "What just happened?"

The princess shook her head. "I don't know. Whatever it was, it's probably over." Millerna said this with confidence, but her fingers nervously pinched the lace of her skirt.

"Were we attacked?"

"By Basram? They wouldn't dare violate our treaty. They have too much invested in our economy. And why would they attack a merchant ship?"

"I don't know. It's just…" Hitomi began, and broke off in mid-sentence. A terrifying thought just occurred to her. What if they were seeing the beginnings of another disaster?

"There's nothing to worry about," said a voice behind them. It was Allen. "The currents were a little rough when we flew over the Arges River. We should be reaching Chavant soon."

Turbulence? Hitomi had flown several times in her life, but she had never experienced turbulence like this. But she didn't question him because there was an air of ever-present competence to Allen had that never failed to ease her fears. Maybe it was different with leviships. Airplanes and leviships were not the same thing, after all. It probably had to do with physics or aerodynamics or something like that.

There was a movement beyond Allen's shoulder, and she saw a boot on the top step of the staircase just before it disappeared above deck.

-

Van Fanel was irritated. For the last hour or so, he had suffered the company of Dryden and his head inventor. The former he never cared for, and the latter refused to leave him alone. At first, both of them had talked incessantly about Atlantis, pestered Van with questions about the Draconians (which he mostly could not answer), and competed with each other in their knowledge of ancient myths. At last, Dryden was called away by his crew, and Van thought he would finally be left in peace. Until Wellyn brought up Basram, that is.

"You should at least think about it, Van-sama. For the good of Fanelia."

Van scowled silently at the feathery clouds that tapered into the distance and met the ocean on the horizon. They were standing on the top deck of the _Ariel_, discussing the Princess Renau. Or rather, Wellyn was discussing her and Van was rebuffing him every chance he could get.

With the world falling into ruin around them, this was not the time to be courting princesses or chasing after myths. But somehow Dryden had convinced him to come, and Wellyn was making his point known. It was true that Basram had been furtively scouting Asturia's borders. There had also been whispers about undisclosed research on the few remains of Dornkirk's fate-alteration machine. The Basramian government's behavior was unusual, that was certain.

According to Wellyn, it would be poor political form if the king of Fanelia entered the capital of Basram unannounced. Van agreed with him on that count. When Wellyn mentioned the meetings he would have to arrange out of courtesy, Van was not pleased but he saw the necessity of formality. It was when Wellyn brought up the Princess Renau that Van's mood began to sour again.

Unlike the other nations of Gaea, Basram was a republic. It was ruled by a prime minister and several bodies of legislature, including a Senate and a Council. This mode of government was relatively new, having been put into motion only three hundred years ago after a long and bloody revolution. The royal family still existed, mostly as a figurehead, but many of its members were still involved in lawmaking and government. As it happened, the Prime Minister himself was a prince, the third son of Queen Alisa. His daughter was Renau de la Baroche, a young Senator who was quickly rising in prominence.

Van was supposed to meet her in the first week of Red. But he was long overdue; it was almost the end of the month. Wellyn was right when he said that marrying Renau would forge a strong bond between two powerful countries, but Van did not see why he had to bring it up now. Marriages and alliances were not priorities at the moment.

But Wellyn had insisted. It was bad enough that Van had missed their appointment, and completely disregarding the princess this time would add insult to injury. Van had protested that he couldn't help missing it, and Wellyn responded by saying that it didn't matter. It was poor political etiquette, he claimed, but Van thought his argument was rather weak. This sort of thing could wait.

"You know, Van-sama," Wellyn had also said at one point, "they say her beauty can make a man forget who he is."

What was the difference? Beautiful or not, courting her would be a waste of time. It would go the way it had gone with all the other noblewomen—awkward and dull. She would make small talk, and he would not know what to say and not care all that much. Well, he tried to care, enough to satisfy the people who were counting on him. Half the time, he asked himself what he was doing in the first place. He had not been around many girls before or known what to do around them. Merle didn't count, because she had been there his whole life and she was like his right arm. The only other girl he had really known was Hitomi, and she—

Van scrubbed a hand through his hair in irritation. He didn't want to think about Hitomi right now. She said she would stay, but in the end, she was still going to leave. And then she was going to marry the man she loved on the Mystic Moon. He did not know why he was thinking about her. There was no point. He didn't want to think about marriage, either, because thoughts of Hitomi crept in every time he did. But he should not see it as an issue of marriage. It was a political alliance, the joining of two nations. That was all. Government, politics, and the good of his kingdom.

He hunched his shoulders as he leaned over the wall of the deck. Maybe if he agreed to see Renau, Wellyn would go away. "I'll think about it," he mumbled miserably.

Wellyn clapped him heartily on the back. "That's more like it, Van-sama. By the way," and he leaned closer as if speaking in confidence, "it would not be a bad opportunity to try and ferret out Basram's motives."

Van gave a grudging nod. Wellyn would not have pressed him so hard if he did not think it would be worthwhile. He would meet with Renau de la Baroche, then. It might prove more fruitful than digging through dusty books in the national libraries.

The sun arced lower in the sky and the River Arges stretched below them like a shimmering road. In the distance, Chavant was nestled in a fork in the river where it split into the Bain and the South Arges. A brisk wind caught Van's hair, and soon the leviship began to shudder as the air currents lifted and swirled. Cries of surprise and dismay drifted up from the steering room. The ship dipped to starboard, knocking Van flat on his back. He grabbed one of the wooden posts buttressing the deck wall to keep from rolling around as the winds bandied the ship about. When the pilots finally brought the _Ariel_ under control, Van stumbled to his feet, slightly nauseous. He leaned against the rail until his head stopped spinning.

What the hell was that? Even though he was not familiar with the wind patterns over Basram, there were certain laws to the way air currents behaved. The patch they just went through was so forceful and disorganized that he would have thought a storm was coming had the sky not been so clear. Now the wind carried them calmly as if nothing had happened. It didn't make sense.

Then Allen ran past him. "Celena!" he cried. That was when Van remembered who else was below deck and why he had avoided going down there.

His boots clomped against the deck and down the stairs. He almost collided with Allen, who had halted in the middle of the stairs, something holding his attention. Van slowed and followed Allen's gaze.

Hitomi lay on the floor with her arms around the white-haired, shuddering heap that was Celena Schezar. She pulled herself up, but Celena's hand had a claw-like grasp on Hitomi's dress. But that was not what threw Van into a rage. There was blood on her dress, a bright patch of red across her midsection. Dilandau. He should have known the monster would not sleep forever. A hand on his sword, he tried to shove Allen aside, but the other man blocked him on the stairs. Allen shook his head firmly. "Look, Van. She's all right. They both are."

Van looked. Hitomi pried the girl's fingers from her dress and cradled her hand, which Van could now see was dripping with blood. He watched as Hitomi quietly sat with Celena, her free hand smoothing back the white hair. Her mouth moved, and though he could not hear the words, he could imagine what they were. He loosened his grip on the hilt of his sword.

"This is why we fell in love with her in the first place, isn't it?" Allen said in a low voice.

Every muscle in Van's body froze. Fell in love? The feelings he had tried so hard to bury welled up, nameless and suffocating in their intensity. He gripped the metal railing. The floor seemed to shift beneath his feet even though the _Ariel_ continued to sail smoothly through the sky.

"Anyone she comes in contact with, she puts their hearts at ease." Allen was watching Van now.

Van kept his eyes trained on the vertical bar of the railing. His heart was not at ease, but he wanted it to be. How deeply he wished it could be. He was almost in that place when he faced Hitomi in the cold of the conference room in Asturia. He wished he could give himself up to the emotion that pushed against his barrier and threatened to carry him away. But it was not something he could want, not as king. Especially when she did not feel the same way. Thoughts like this made him forget why kings marry, made him pine after what would forever be out of reach. When a person was king, he had certain duties and was one with duty and country. There was no room for anything else.

But his father had married his mother, a woman of a cursed people who was not of this world. He married her because he loved her.

He lingered while Allen approached the women, who had been joined by Millerna. They turned in Allen's direction, and Van's breath caught when he thought Hitomi was looking at him. But her gaze brushed past him, seeing only Allen and whatever news he bore. She met Allen with such hope that it pricked Van's heart. Was that how she looked at him, the man she was to marry? She ducked her head and the anxiety in her face melted away as she listened to Allen's assurances. She never did that with Van, not that he could remember. With him, it was always warnings and concern but rarely ever reassurance. It seemed that most things he did made her worried or upset. But Allen never made her upset. Her fiancé probably never did, either. Before she raised her head again, Van hurried up the steps so he would not have to meet her eyes.

-

Author's Note #2: I've recently set up a forum for this fic. I'd love it if you checked it out. Questions and comments are more than welcome!


	14. Chavant

Author's note: And here you thought I would never update. Sorry for the wait!

-

**The Last Night of the World **

**Chapter 13 **

**Chavant **

-

Arriving in Chavant was a welcome change from the frigid atmosphere of Palas. The travelers shed their thick cloaks and wool jackets and basked in the sun that had been hidden from them for so long. The air was almost tropical. The great city of the river nation tried its best to escape being metropolitan: the wide streets were interspersed with lush patches of lawn outlined by neat rows of granite brick, and trees laden with delicate red blossoms swayed gently in the breeze. There were elaborate fountains at many intersections. Hitomi didn't know if she was in the capital of a powerful country or a well-manicured garden.

There were several carriages awaiting their arrival, open and airy, with wide windows cut into the front and the back. The buildings of Chavant were no less rich than their surroundings. As Hitomi and the others were escorted to the palace, they passed by white-washed walls trimmed with gold paint, the doors and shutters painted in vibrant colors, spared from the harsh winters that plagued the more northerly climes. The townspeople looked up as the carriages passed by, as though the newcomers, decked in their heavy grays and blues, brought the chill breath of winter with them.

Hitomi shared a carriage with Millerna, Allen, and Celena. Van was in the first carriage ahead of them, accompanied by Wellyn and eventually by Merle, who had insisted on clinging at his side. As Van was of royal blood, he naturally had the place of honor in the train of carriages, and it was no less than expected to have his closest retainers with him. But even though it made sense, even though it was right and proper, Hitomi couldn't help feeling stung that he did not offer to include her. She had chosen to go home to Yutaro, that was true, but both of them knew that staying had never been an option. Even so, when she was together with Allen, she and Van had still been friends, of a sort. And of all their conflicts and misunderstandings, this act of omission was by far the worst. It was so official. That he was the ruler of a nation and she was merely a guest could not have been made more clear. Gone were the days when the trust between them went unspoken, when her place in Van's life was undisputed, comfortable fact.

To take her mind off her brooding thoughts, Hitomi occupied herself with the passing scenery. But even the trees with their sweetly scented flowers could not draw her attention away from the carriage in front. She caught herself straining to see Van through the window in front, partially obscured by the coachman's back. _Things are different now_¸ she told herself. _We have our own lives. He is the king of Fanelia, and this is the way it's supposed to be._

Then Merle turned to Van, apparently very excited about something, and pointed out the window. He obligingly looked in that direction and nodded his head with mild interest. A surge of resentment rose in Hitomi's chest, and suddenly there was nothing more interesting than the pattern of bricks that paved the road. _This is how it's supposed to be_, she silently repeated.

They were received at the palace gates by a retinue of soldiers, who bore tall poles with the twin serpent crest of Basram emblazoned on bright red flags. The footmen hurried to open the carriage doors. The passengers descended and assembled themselves facing the palace, an imposing structure of stone and marble with smooth pillars so thick that not even four men could even wrap their arms around them. The wall of pillars had left enough space for a wide, sprawling staircase to allow entrance to the palace. The soldiers formed two rows on either side of the courtyard and rapped the poles on the ground in unison. "Basram welcomes the King of Fanelia and his companions," they intoned. "Our Princess, Renau de la Baroche, and the Goddess of Fortune welcome you with open arms."

Then, from the shadows of the colonnade, a woman emerged in long robes, flanked by four ceremonial guards, and she glided down the stairs into the courtyard. Dark curls framed a face that could have been chiseled from alabaster. Two chestnut strands by her temples were laced with gold thread, and she was arrayed in a white robe with a mantle of gold and purple draped over her arms. She spread her hands in a gesture of hospitality. "A hundred blessings on Fanelia and Asturia. It is an honor to be graced by your presence."

Van stepped forward and bowed deeply, deliberately. "A hundred blessings on you and your house, Princess."

Hitomi had never been welcomed with such ceremony before—by a goddess no less—and suddenly the wrinkles on her dress were deeper and the stray hairs of her braids were wild and windblown. But greater than her self-consciousness was Van. He seemed so different: so regal, so much older, even when dressed in the simple red shirt and white pants he always wore. This was a side of him she had never seen before. When had he learned to carry himself this well?

"Please forgive my father's absence," said the princess. "Troubles in the east have taken him away from Chavant for the time being. I welcome you in his place. You are free to stay until he returns. We offer you our rivers as your waterways and our vino as your drink as a sign of our friendship."

"I thank you for your kindness, Princess. The purpose of our visit is—with your permission—to research the legends and prophecies of the oracles of old. Perhaps they will shed some light onto the unnatural events that have taken place."

"Certainly," she replied. "I will see to it that your every need is met. Meanwhile, let us gather in the Rosewood Parlor."

As the flag-bearers lined up next to the travelers, Hitomi was unsure of what to do next. Thankfully, Millerna touched her elbow and guided her so they were standing two and two, right behind Allen and his sister. Dryden and Wellyn were behind them, and Van was at the very front, exchanging pleasantries with Princess Renau as a scrutinizing Merle clung from the other side. To Hitomi's surprise, he offered the princess his arm. _That's rather…unusual_. As they walked together arm in arm, Hitomi mused that there must be an etiquette among royalty that she'd never had the chance to witness. Or maybe they had known each other as children. But he had never offered _her_ his arm before. Never. Not even after they realized how they felt about each other.

But Van walked very naturally and the princess held her shoulders proudly, and everything about them spoke of formality. Yes, this behavior must be expected between members of royalty, Hitomi thought as she unconsciously smoothed out the wrinkles in her dress. And if she hadn't known better, she would have thought Van was the two women's object of affection, with his attention captured by the princess and Merle hanging on jealously.

-

Afternoon tea was something that probably should have never happened. At first, the princess discussed matters of no great consequence, such as the health of the royal house or the current gossip. Most of the conversation was carried by Dryden and Allen, who were the more glib of tongue. However, when two men of such opposing personalities gathered in the same room, even the most innocuous topics had potential to develop into heated controversy. There was a point when the conversation turned to gossip about the latest scandal: a nobleman from a prominent family had abandoned home and duty for the glory of hunting dragons in the north. There had been no word of him for several months, and he was presumed dead. Consequently, he was disowned by his own house and his wife and children were left to fend for themselves. Despite the misfortune the nobleman caused with his actions, Dryden wholeheartedly approved of his decision. Allen, on the other hand, declared that some dreams were not worth pursuing.

Dryden peered at Allen over his spectacles. "Ah, but a real man does not let his dream pass by when it is within reach."

Allen's brow remained stern. "If he was truly a man, he would not abandon his duty to those who depend on him."

Dryden slapped his knee and laughed, a harsh sound that grated on Hitomi's nerves. "You Knights of Caeli! Always so hidebound by honor and duty!"

"It's better than being unscrupulous and completely lacking in both," Allen said tightly.

Hitomi squirmed in her chair, though the princess appeared vaguely amused by their thinly veiled barbs. She wished that Renau would say something—anything—to defuse the brewing conflict. But the princess merely looked on as Hitomi and Wellyn attempted to mollify both sides, with rather limited success. Finally, after what seemed like an eternity, the princess took leave of them, apologizing that her work called her away from their company. Her departure could not have come any sooner. Hitomi quickly stood and followed the others out of the room, her muscles creaking in relief. She had half a mind to berate Dryden for provoking Allen, whether it was intentional or not. But before she could, the merchant waved for her to follow him and walked off without looking back.

Refusing to be treated so casually, Hitomi caught up to him and planted herself squarely in his path. "Dryden, I know that you and Allen may not always get along, but that was uncalled for."

Dryden seemed surprised at her observation. "You don't approve of my opinions?"

"I don't approve of the way you were leading Allen on."

"Leading him on?" He gave a short laugh. "My opinions are what they are. If Allen can't stomach them, that's his problem."

When he saw that Hitomi was still not satisfied, he folded his arms and said, a little more seriously, "I don't take back anything I said. But I don't deny that I was trying to influence where the conversation was going. I've had more than my fill of mind-dulling gossip about Basram's noble houses."

Dryden's justification made Hitomi even more nettled at his suffocating self-assurance. So she stubbornly stalled when Dryden asked her to accompany him to the lower levels of the main library. It wasn't until Wellyn requested her help that she agreed to join them. She couldn't bear the thought of spending the rest of the afternoon alone with Dryden, but she liked Wellyn and his open, boyish manner. He was not as talkative as the Asturian merchant, nor was he as reticent as Van, but she felt comfortable around him.

Once they reached the basement, the two men promptly became lost in the pages of the tomes that covered the walls. Hitomi, still unsure of the role she was supposed to play, wandered between rows of dusty bookshelves. The scent of old books and mildew tickled her nose, and she resisted the urge to sneeze. She lightly ran her fingers over the spines of gold lettering that had faded with the centuries. Though many of the titles were in different languages, the curious ability that enabled her to read the inscription in the temple of Godashim allowed her to decipher the strange characters in front of her. This was probably why Dryden needed her help. Civilization had existed long enough on Gaea for language to evolve into many incarnations, and there was no way that Dryden, educated as he was, could know them all.

Her fingers halted as one title caught her eye: _Dragon's Heart_. She slipped it out from between _History of the Seven Tribes_ and _The Code of the Samurai_ and held it carefully between her palms. It was a slim volume, barely thicker than two fingers. The cover was lined with blue fabric, the letters embroidered in silver thread. A cloud of dust scattered when she opened the book, and she sneezed fitfully. The pages were sheets of heavy parchment, and their weight spoke of something ancient and momentous.

The contents of the book were as unassuming as its cover. The lettering was blocky and stark; the handwriting was uniform and marched across the page in straight, orderly rows. There was not even a title page. The only embellishment was a faintly inked serpent with a dragon's head, its body twisting and curling around the border until the tail met the head at the top right corner. Tufts of hair covered its head, and it had a flat, tapered snout. The eyebrows were bushy and wise, and long whiskers trailed from its lips. _A Chinese dragon?_ In its claws it grasped a longsword by the blade. The olive green coloring of its skin was faded and cracked, and the eyes were flecked with gold.

The handwriting, although neat, was small, forcing Hitomi to squint. The lighting was also very dim, so she moved closer to a candelabrum atop a small table spaced between the shelves. She settled herself into a nearby chair and began to read.

_This is the story of Fanaelia, the land of dragons. This is the account of how Laras Varga de Fanel slew the great dragon Escaflowne and came to rule over all of Fanaelia. _

The first king of Fanelia rose to the throne by slaying Escaflowne? So why did Fanelians pray to the dragon for rain and protection from hardship? Hitomi did not know much about Fanelian culture, but she knew that Van's guymelef was named after the same deity that the people of Fanelia worshiped. It didn't make sense.

As Hitomi puzzled over this mystery, something burned hot against her skin. Her pendant. She nearly dropped the book in her haste to pull it out from under her dress. The jewel had turned blood red and pulsed with a life of its own, and everything around her was suddenly angry and menacing in its red light. The dragon on the page seemed to shiver, as though trying to break free from the confines of its two-dimensional world. Its eyes had become red, too, and the green skin was brighter than before. The dragon shivered again and lifted its head off the page. The drawing of the head grew and grew until Hitomi was looking into the face of a breathing, growling dragon. It snarled through teeth that were longer than her arm and blew out its whiskers with each breath. It stared as though carefully weighing its prey. Then it opened its mouth, a cave of flesh and hot breath, and lunged.

-

When his party dispersed, Van was relieved to finally be left alone. Merle had wanted to stay with him, but he firmly asked her to direct the servants in unloading their belongings. Escaflowne had already been lodged in the city's guymelef hangars; like his sword, the guymelef went wherever he went. Wellyn went off with Hitomi and Dryden, and wherever Allen and Celena ended up going, he did not care. Van just wanted to be alone. He needed to think.

The princess of Basram was as beautiful as Wellyn had promised. So beautiful that even Van had noticed. Although, truth be told, if he had passed her in the street, if they had shared an afternoon discussing economics and treaties, he would not have cared or noticed much. Beautiful women were not hard to find if one paid attention, and they were merely strangers of little consequence unless they could creep underneath the skin of Van's life. That was the way it was with Van. But of all the women in his half-hearted courtship, Renau was somehow different.

It probably had to do with why he was in Basram in the first place. Though, actually, the real reason why he was there had little to do with his reaction to Renau. The reason he _wasn't_ there for was what took him off guard. He had been prepared to greet a stern, middle-aged man in ceremonial garb. But instead, it was Renau, and it was like being received by an angel. Van was expecting to be an ambassador, and the next thing he knew, he was in the beginnings of a courtship. Without the anticipation and dread of a long, uncomfortable few hours, it was…not unpleasant. If all went well, if he found her acceptable—if she was amenable to marriage—then he would no longer have to look for a wife. His advisors would be satisfied, and Fanelia would have an heir. And eventually, they might even fall in love.

If he married Renau, then what of Hitomi? By the time he married, Hitomi would have gone back to the Mystic Moon. She would be married herself and would have already forgotten about him. Which, apparently, was not a hard thing to do.

She might forget him, but would he forget her? How he wished to say he would, but the truth refused to be hemmed in by his pride. She had changed his life so much in the short time she was on Gaea. Forgetting her would be like forgetting Folken or Balgus ever existed.

Van found himself on the palace grounds, wandering around with no real aim in mind. The walk loosened him up and helped let out some of the tension behind his thoughts. He ended up by a two-tiered fountain with the statuettes of three graceful women on top. Few things soothed his spirit better than watching the water flow from a fountain, perhaps because fountains brought him back to a time when life was calm and carefree, when his mother still tended to him and Folken carried him on his back. He spent much of his younger days outdoors, exploring the gardens under his brother's charge. One garden in particular, tucked away in the corner of the castle grounds, was his favorite. It did not have the orderly, artificial feeling of the other gardens, which were carefully pruned and arranged by the groundsmen. Instead, the trees grew where they wished and the flowers were wild and untamed. It was his mother's garden. His father had built it for her because she missed her home in the forest, and he ordained that no one should tend to it but her. There was also a fountain in the middle of the garden, hidden by the trees so that each time Van happened upon it, it was a new discovery. Sometimes his mother would be there, reading a book or sweeping leaves out of the water. Other times it was Folken, and they would play hide-and-seek among the trees or mock wrestle under the sun. It was his refuge, a place he could go to when he wanted to escape his lessons or get away from the stuffy indoors. Until the day Folken disappeared. His mother began to let the garden fall into disrepair, and she spent less and less time at the fountain. Weeds overtook the wildflowers, and the fountain filled up with leaves that had become boggy with water and began to rot. Then one day, his mother disappeared as well. The fountain stopped flowing, and creeping vines grew out of the bed of dead leaves, their roots crumbling the stone. The garden was soon reclaimed by the forest, and Van had not ventured into it since.

Van balanced himself on the edge of the fountain basin and watched as the water arched and fell into the pool below. Folken. If he had not disappeared, Van would not be in this situation today. No, that was not entirely true. His brother had relinquished any claim to the throne over a decade ago. If Folken had reappeared before Van came of age, Van would have happily let him take on the leadership of Fanelia. But Van had already been crowned, and even if Folken had survived the Great War, the people would never accept him. In their eyes, the older Fanel died fifteen years ago when he failed to return from the rite of dragonslaying.

Van wished he could see Folken again. To ask him what to do, to learn about the brother he barely knew. To say goodbye.

Hitomi was the last person to see Folken alive. She was the one who accepted him when Van, his own brother, could not. Van's heart grew heavy at the thought. Not for the first time, he wished that he possessed some of Hitomi's ability to believe in the goodness of people. Even though she had been hunted and kidnapped by Folken's followers, she did not fear the traitorous Fanel or his intentions. Van, on the other hand, suspected Folken to the very end, watching him from the shadows, waiting for the slightest hint of treachery.

Some would have called Hitomi naïve. Van had, at first. Having his homeland ravaged by the one who was meant to be its protector was not a matter easily forgotten. Not to mention his image of Folken had been irreversibly tarnished once he discovered the truth about Zaibach's Strategos. And Folken had betrayed him, his own brother. Even if Folken had lived, they were too estranged to ever be reconciled. That was why Van watched Folken so closely. Part of him could not believe that the dark man with the clawed hand was the same person whom Van had dreamed of becoming when he was younger. It was as though someone had stolen his brother's face and acted out his life in a cruel parody.

Hitomi had given ground where Van could not. Through her, Van caught glimpses of the brother he remembered from so long ago. If it had not been for Hitomi, Van would have been too blinded by suspicion to notice the patience in Folken's staid, brooding manner, or the gentleness in his words whether he was speaking to Hitomi or to the king of Asturia.

Resentment gradually gave way to grudging respect, but Van still could not accept his brother. It had not been enough for Folken to prove himself true, or to become a person that Van might want to trust again.

It was because Folken was a coward. A coward, and a traitor twice over.

Folken should have returned to Fanelia. Dornkirk may have saved his life, but Fanelia was his home and his people. The blood of the kingdom ran in his veins. Once he recovered from his injuries, he should have slain another dragon, should have returned to be crowned king and protector of Fanelia. Failure to fulfill his duty was betrayal in itself. And so the younger prince rose to the throne while the elder was still alive. No amount of deeds or reparations could redeem Folken from such dishonor. Fighting to end the fighting? There was no such thing. Not when it involved sacrificing his own people and delivering his brother to the enemy. It was a hollow claim riddled with deceit and self-delusion, a coward's excuse to justify his thirst for power.

It wasn't until Folken's death, however, that Van realized how wrong he had been. A coward would not have gone to Zaibach without any way of returning. A coward would not have faced the tyrant of an empire knowing that his chances of leaving alive were next to none. If Folken had been mistaken about the path he chose, at least he knew he would have to follow it to its conclusion, good or ill. And follow it he did.

In the end, it was Van who was the coward. Accepting Folken would have meant accepting that the solemn-faced monster was his brother, his blood. It would have been better to believe that Folken was dead; at least Van's memory would be untarnished then. So instead, Van clung to what was comfortable and familiar. Shielding himself was more important than taking the risk of forgiving the person he once thought could do no wrong.

Only when Folken died was Van able to let go of his fear. He could sense Folken's life fading away, as though they shared a dormant bond that was heightened by danger and emotion. When Van could no longer feel his brother, fear was replaced by the coldness of realizing that he was truly alone. Regret had drowned out anything else, and though time had dulled the edge of his sorrow, it accompanied him like a pebble in his boot. Most of the time he didn't notice it, but there were times when the feeling was fresh and sharp like a thorn catching an old wound.

Someone nearby cleared his throat. "Excuse me, King Van of Fanelia?" ventured a young voice.

Van raised his head to see a boy in red and white livery standing nervously before him. The boy fidgeted under Van's gaze, and the words came out of his mouth in a flood. "I apologize for disturbing you. I…I have a message from Princess Renau. She would like to extend an invitation to you and your party to d-dine with her tonight. The first course will be served within the hour, so p-please prepare yourselves appropriately."

That meant Van would have to change into his dress clothes. He hoped the servants had been able to transport his belongings in time. Normally, he did not care about what another ruler thought about his appearance; Fanelians were known to be simple in dress and way of life, and he was not about to change that for a formality. But courtship was different. He had learned the hard way that dressing plainly could be considered offensive. And for once, he would not have minded having to attend dinner, but he really was not in the state of mind to go. He wished that it was over and he was back in his chambers already.

"Y-your reply, ou-sama?"

Van had nearly forgotten about the messenger boy. "Yes, thank you. Please tell the princess that I will attend, and inform the rest of my party."

"As you wish, Your Highness." After a quick bob at the waist, the boy scurried off.

Van slowly stood up. It had been a very long time since he thought about Folken; the dark things of the present were stirring up the past. He had also been having nightmares again. There was fire and ice in the cities of Gaea, and it was usually Fanelia or Palas, but sometimes it was Atlantis. In his dreams, he had to defend townspeople from the fiery rage of dragons or the plodding footsteps of ice giants. Even when he told them to run, they would not run. No matter how hard he tried to protect them, he was able to save only a handful. The ones who remained, however, turned on him in anger. You let the others die, they accused. You let them die because you are a coward. You are a coward, and you are not fit to be king. Then they fell upon him, forcing him to defend himself lest he be torn limb from limb. In the end, he was left with only his bloodied sword, surrounded by the lifeless bodies of his people. Even the dragons and giants he had slain took on human form. He was alone, all alone with the falling embers of the charred city.

Other times, he tried to run, chased by the screams of those he had abandoned. The outcome was still the same: only he survived within the remains of a dying city. Except in those times, he was all the more a coward.

Reaching down into the fountain, Van scooped up a handful of water and splashed it on his face. The cool water dampened the heated images from his nightmares. He should not spend anymore time dwelling on the past or his dreams if he was to make this visit worthwhile. That meant he would have to be alert for any word, any sign that Basram might have any plans that were less than benign. He could not be distracted by the princess. Basramian soldiers patrolling the borders of their neighbors Egzardia and Freid was nothing unusual, but there were abandoned camps as far north as Daedalus that were marked with Basram's serpent crest. There was nothing missing from the supplies, and the stench of rotting food nearly made the scouts gag. Neither human nor horse was in sight. Where the soldiers disappeared to, nobody knew, and the eerie situation made the other kingdoms nervous. Basram denied any knowledge of these happenings and claimed that the camps belonged to rogue soldiers who had defected from the ranks. Van did not know how much information he would actually be able to glean from the princess, but he had to try. At least she would not be on her guard tonight.

-

Note:_ ou-sama_ is a respectful way of addressing someone as "king" in Japanese


End file.
